Unification (Formerly Eureka!)
by Nerdherder51
Summary: Zarina invents a new dust which has the potential to unify the warm and cold sides of Pixie Hollow. However, when this new dust can't help Clarion and Milori be together Tinker Bell embarks on a quest to finish what Zarina started. Rated T for Teen.
1. Chapter 1

**EUREKA!**

* * *

"EUREKA!" Zarina shouted. She had burst open the door to Tinker Bell's workshop and startled the tinker fairy badly. The Pixie Dust Alchemist was covered in layers of shimmering dust and holding a flask of glowing, pale blue pixie dust.

Tink, who had been pondering a new and more efficient design for the snowmaker, was nearly frightened right out of her shoes by Zarina's sudden appearance. She carefully removed the goggles from her face and caught her breath. "Wha-? What happened?"

"I did it!" the alchemist replied, a beaming smile across her face. "I did it and it works."

Tinker Bell stepped forward and inspected the flask. She had always been excited for Zarina and her ideas. Though, regretfully, Tink wasn't as supportive as she should have been when the dust keeper first revealed her alchemy experiments. It might have prevented the girl from being publically humiliated and running off with pirates. "Did what?" Tink asked as she eyed the pale blue dust.

"I made a dust that can turn anyone into a Winter Fairy," she gleefully explained.

"Huh?!" Tink couldn't utter another word. She stopped everything to try and process what she had just been told. "Wait, did you say 'Winter Fairy'?"

"Uh huh." Zarina stretched out her arm holding the flask of dust. "This can change anyone into a frost talent. I just mixed in a touch of frost, a clipping from a frozen leaf and added just the tiniest pinch of Blue Pixie Dust and there you have it, frost talent dust."

So stunned by this revelation that Tink had trouble sputtering out her next question. "Does it work…, I mean it can…, we can turn into…, and we can go into…, without jackets or, or…?"

"Frosting our wings or wearing heavy jackets? Yes, Tink."

Tink was desperate to sit. This revelation had made her weak in the knees. She stumbled backwards toward a chair, but missed it and dropped to the floor, landing on her bum. Her breathing was hard, her eyes wide as saucers, her heart beat like a tinker's hammer. The stunning implications of this new discovery flashed through her mind. "…And our wings won't break?"

"No. Not in the Winter Woods, but they can if you return to the warm seasons without changing back into a warm talent."

"Into the warm season…. Wait? Did you already test it?" Tink asked.

"On myself. All last week. It works perfectly." Zarina was all smiles. "Do you know what this means, Tink?"

"I can…, I can finally visit my sister without having to worry about my wings," Tink muttered. "I can learn what it means to be a frost fairy. I can finally share her world, be what she is, and learn her talent. We'll be closer than ever."

"And she can share yours in the same way," Zarina added. "That's why I came here first. With a pinch of dust she can become a warm fairy and visit you all she wants without the need of the snow machine."

Tinker Bell turned and looked at her plans. She was so close to finishing the new design. It was lighter, easier to maneuver and navigate through tight quarters. She even had an idea for one that Periwinkle could wear. But if this new dust worked as advertised the machine was unnecessary. As a sister, Tink's heart jumped for joy. As a tinker fairy and designer she felt a bit sad. So much work had gone into this new design and it would never see the light of day. But if it meant she and Peri could live in each other's respective worlds without any encumbrance or limitation then it would be worth it.

"Zarina, do you know what you've done? You have finally united the two halves of our world," Tink exulted. "This is going to be the beginning of a new era for all of Pixie Hollow."

"YES!" the alchemist shouted. "Now come on." Zarina grabbed Tink's arm and dragged her out the door.

"Wha? Where?"

"Where else? To the queen."

Of course to the queen. She would want to know. She would need to know. As much as Tinker Bell, Clarion had a stake in tearing down the last wall between the warm and cold seasons of the fairy home world.

 **~O~**

"Remarkable," Queen Clarion gasped when she heard the news. "This works as intended?"

"Yes, Queen Clarion," Zarina answered. "I've spent the last week in the Winter Woods as a frost fairy. I wore no special clothing, my wings were never frosted to protect them and I learned the talent of the frost fairies."

"There are no ill effects?"

"None, except that you must change back into a warm season talent when you return across the border," the alchemist warned. "Otherwise, it is free of any side effects. You can finally oversee your entire kingdom without need of special precautions. And you can visit Lord Milori indefinitely."

The queen hovered silently, staring meditatively at the pale blue dust. That last part was what the queen wanted to know. She had avoided asking about it so as not to appear more concerned about herself than her subjects.

"I see," was her calm and dignified response. Outwardly Clarion was as conservative as ever. Inside she felt wave after wave of relief and gratitude.

Then came a thought.

"How will I change back when I'm ready to return to the warm seasons?" the queen asked.

Instantly the huge grin on Zarina's face collapsed and her heart sunk. She had been too excited to remember that nothing in her considerable arsenal of special talent dusts could allow the queen to be a queen again. "I… I have nothing. I am very sorry Your Highness. I raised your hopes needlessly."

"Nonsense. This is a monumental achievement," Queen Clarion answered, offering a sincere if weak smile. "You have further opened the border for all of Pixie Hollow. I am quite pleased. Now why don't you escort Tinker Bell to the Winter Woods? I am quite certain she is eager to visit her sister."

Zarina bowed reverently. "Thank you, Your Highness." She and Tinker Bell left the Pixie Dust Tree where the queen resided and held court. The alchemist was mortified for not anticipating that the queen would need the means to turn back into a queen. Zarina felt as though she had just cruelly teased Clarion with something she had wanted to desperately but could not have.

The alchemist handed the vial of dust to Tinker Bell and instructed that a small sprinkling was all she needed. She also handed the tinker fairy the dust that could return the blonde fairy to her warm season roots.

"Where are you going?" Tink asked.

"I feel sick," Zarina replied. "I'm going home."

 **~O~**

Inside the Pixie Dust Tree Queen Clarion carried on with her day as though nothing of any importance happened. She remained placidly attentive through each ceremony, every review and in her meetings with the ministers. Inside she was torn up. Finally there seemed to be an answer to her prayers only for it to evaporate in the blink of an eye.

"So much the better," she tried telling herself. "If anyone could become queen with a mere sprinkling of dust then it would become a useless designation."

She was equivocating. Trying to soothe her broken heart and spirit. That evening, such equivocation fell apart and her perfect demeanor shattered. Within the privacy of her quarters, Clarion wept sorrowfully.

So close. So tantalizingly close.


	2. Chapter 2

**2.**

* * *

She sighed. Periwinkle sat looking plaintively at the fern she was supposed to frost and sighed. The frost fairy was sitting on a rock, hunched over, first staring at a blue-green leaf before gazing beyond it into space. She looked as dejected as anyone could.

Milori the Lord of the Winter Woods must have seen how despairing she appeared because he put his hand on her shoulder and spoke with her. "Periwinkle? Why aren't you with your sister? This is your day off."

Peri did not turn to look at him. Instead she began to twirl the long leaf of the fern in her finger.

"We weren't up to it," the young frost talent replied.

"Not up to it? But you were so excited. You've waited all week for this day to arrive," MIlori answered, confused. "Ever since Zarina invented dust which could make any warm fairy into a winter talent it has been all I could do you keep you grounded."

"Not every warm fairy," Periwinkle clarified. She turned to face him, her eyes welled up with tears. "Zarina does not have any dust that restore Queen Clarion's Regent Talent. If she becomes a winter fairy then she can only revert to an ordinary warm season fairy."

"I see," Milori answered. "And the same would apply to me, I presume."

"Yes. Tinker Bell and I could not enjoy ourselves knowing you and Queen Clarion could never be together the same way the rest of us now can."

Milori smiled. "Do not worry so, child. Compared to our previous arrangement the current situation is… most liberating. Now go, enjoy yourself and think nothing more of it."

Peri smiled in return. She had not thought of it this way. "Thank you, Lord Milori. I'll go right now. Tinker Bell will be so excited."

"Yes, I'm sure she will. And please give the queen my regards."

She bowed reverently. "Of course, Lord Milori."

 **~O~**

There was a knock at the door. Tinker Bell sighed. A second distraction in as many days. After Zarina's disastrous meeting with the queen yesterday, Tink immersed herself in completing her plans for a new snowmaker. If Lord Milori couldn't safely become a warm fairy to visit Queen Clarion whenever he wanted then she would accommodate him as much possible.

The nearly completed blueprints were now accompanied by a new sheet of blue leaf paper. These pages were notes for a series of "re-icing" stations. The stations were insulated storage units which would store blocks of ice so Lord Milori could continue to refill the snow maker without needing to return to the border. The insulated stations were in the preliminary stage and Tinker Bell needed to be alone to focus on perfecting them.

She thus decided to ignore the person at the door.

Knock! Knock!

"Go away," she hissed through gritted teeth.

KNOCK! KNOCK!

"Ugh!" Tinker Bell angrily ripped the goggles from her head and pulled open the door handle. She was prepared to greet the intruder with an icy glare. The glare was knocked off by the shock of a familiar face.

"Periwinkle?"

"Hi."

Tinker Bell's sister was dressed not in her usual ice blue clothing, but in the same brilliant green that Tinker Bell wore with splotches of winter blue mixed into it. Peri's shock of white hair was decorated with a fresh periwinkle bloom.

"How? Of course I know how, you used Zarina's special dust. What I mean is… HOW?"

Peri giggled. "Lord Milori said it was okay. He and Queen Clarion can still be together. It's much better than being forever isolated all those centuries."

"Huh. I never thought of it that way. Well, now that you're here, what do you want to do?"

"Well, we never did finish that tour of the warm seasons the last time I was here," Peri noted.

"Then by all means, let's finish."

Periwinkle spun in the air, giggling and clapping with delight. "Ooh, I should pay a visit to the Queen. Lord Milori wants me to send his regards."

"Okay, first up on the tour, the Pixie Dust Tree," Tinker Bell said cheerfully. "By the way, where did you get the flower for you hair?"

"Oh, I paid a visit to Rosetta first," Periwinkle acknowledged. "Funny thing, as soon as she handed me the bloom she bolted straight for the Winter Woods screaming Sled's name all the way."

Tinker Bell roared with laughter. "That's our Rosetta."

~O~

"Oh, I am very sorry, Lord Milori," Dewey the Keeper of All Fairy Knowledge said. "I had real hopes you and the Queen Clarion would be able to spend some quality time together."

After speaking with Periwinkle in the Frost Forest, Milori retreated to the safety of the library and the comforting words of his closest friend.

"Yes, Keeper, so did I. This entire week was filled with promise only for it to be dashed."

"Well, maybe one day such promise will finally come to fruition."

Milori drew in a deep breath, held it for a moment and then slowly let it out. "Perhaps, but I feel it will not be within my lifetime. Clarion and I are fated to be forever apart."

"Oh, now don't think that way," Dewey said with a comforting tone. "I'm sure Zarina will find some way to overcome the ancie-." Dewey cut himself off, but it was too late.

Milori's reply was most stern. "Silence, Keeper. You know the law. None may speak of that."

"My apologies, Lord Milori. It won't happen again."

"See to it that it does not. Your long and keen memory does not serve you well in this matter."

Lord Milori spun on his heels and angrily stormed away. A painful silence hung in the air between them until Milori reached the large double doors. Just before he pushed through to the outside he stopped and spoke, never once turning around. "Watch your tongue, Keep-! Dewey. Please. I would hate to lose my closest friend."

 **~O~**

"What did you find, Nyx," Clarion asked the tall, dark haired female. Nyx was one of a small group of special scouts. Unlike the others of their guild, Nyx and her chosen few received elite training that was far above and beyond the norm for their talent. The "Special Forces" of the scout guild even wore different uniforms to separate themselves from their ordinary peers.

"Just this," she said, presenting rolled up sheets of blue leaf paper. "Designs for a new and more advanced snow maker, including refill stations located throughout the warm seasons."

"And that was all?"

"Yes, Your Highness."

"Excellent. Return them immediately. Before Tinker Bell notices these are missing."

When Periwinkle arrived earlier that day to deliver the message from Lord Milori, Tinker Bell made a promise to never give up searching for a means to allow Lord Milori and Queen Clarion to be together as easily as she and Periwinkle.

The regent smiled and thanked her before trying to talk the little fairy out of it. But Tinker Bell could be a most stubborn girl and Clarion had to find out if she knew or was getting too close for comfort.

Fortunately that was not the case and Clarion was determined to keep it that way.

* * *

 **Okay, well after the "immense outcry" for me to continue I've decided to do just that. Note that the story "Broken Hollow, Broken Hearts" will officially be closed and abandoned as it will be summarized within the pages of this story.**


	3. Chapter 3

**3.**

* * *

Determined as always, Tink had spent several days working on the "re-icing" stations. Her greatest roadblock was how to insulate them so that large blocks of ice would remain solid and viable for long periods of time. She knew that winter coats made with cotton fluff were excellent insulators by keeping the warmth in. Tink thought it might work in reverse, keeping the warmth out and the cold in, however, when cotton fluff got wet, as it would when ice melted, well it just didn't have the staying power she needed. The fluff would get soggy and collapse, losing its fluffiness as the ice melted and rendering it useless as an insulator.

There had to be a better way. Tinker Bell experimented with several different materials to insulate the storage units including layers of fresh picked leaves, fallen autumn leaves, tree bark and highly compressed grass clippings but nothing worked.

One day an old newspaper floated up on the shores of Never Land Island. Tink thought about using it as a heat-proofing but the thin newsprint had already gotten wet in the ocean and when dried the pages warped and turned brittle. It was useless.

Useless until she stumbled across an article within its pages from a strange and distant land called "The Midwestern United States" where it was reported that a giant hailstone had fallen and was on display in a local shop. It was being preserved using sawdust which acted as an effective insulator for the ice.

Sawdust! That was her answer. Tinker Bell collected all she could from the tinker guild each and every day. Then she conducted experiments where she timed how long it took for blocks of ice to melt. Tinker Bell varied both the size and shape of the blocks as well as the amount and distribution of the sawdust until she could extend the viable life of a block of ice as long as possible.

Tinker Bell was quite excited by her progress and decided to file a report with the queen.

"See," Tink said pointing to her blueprints, "this new snowmaking machine is smaller, more efficient and easier to navigate than the old one. And the stations will make it easy for Lord Milori to resupply when the ice gets used up."

"I'm impressed," the queen answered, marveling at Tinker Bell's impressive ingenuity. "But sweetheart, is all this really worth it for just one person?"

"But it's for Lord Milori. Wouldn't you like for him to visit you here in the warm seasons?"

"Yes, I would," Clarion answered truthfully. "But I should point out that while this device will function as intended in the warm seasons it will have a hard time fitting through the doors and hallways of the Pixie Dust Tree."

Tinker Bell gasped, crestfallen. "I hadn't thought of that. I'm sorry, Your Highness. That's twice that someone has given you false hope."

"Not at all, dear. Knowing that you're working on a solution is all the hope I need."

Immediately Tinker Bell's demeanor perked up again. "I won't rest until I've designed something safe and practical."

"Thank you, Tinker Bell, but please don't let your other duties fall by the side. We still need your help preparing for the seasons."

"I won't, Queen Clarion."

Periwinkle had shown real talent as a tinker. She was just as creative and inquisitive as her sister. When she next visited her sister Peri found Tink mulling over the snow machine plans. The little blonde had come to an impasse and couldn't tinker her way around her problem. The snowmaker needed certain components to function and some ultimately defined the size of the machine. Parts like the cheese grater and wire basket for the ice limited how small the machine could be made.

"I can't believe it, Peri," Tink lamented. "I've tried turning it sideways, laying it flat, tipping it on end, it's impossible. I… I failed."

"Something will come to you, Tink," Periwinkle said supportively. "It always does. Maybe you just need to walk away from it. Let your mind rest so you can approach it fresh."

"Maybe you're right."

Tinker Bell flopped down on her seashell bed. Periwinkle did the same on a trundle bed they two had built to accommodate Peri during her visits. Being sisters the two girls stared up at the same spot of the ceiling: the slow spinning fan.

Tink sighed signaling defeat. Periwinkle sighed signaling her dislike of Tink's sighing.

"What if you used a fan instead of a cheese grater?" Peri asked hoping to spark Tink's creativity.

"No, the spinning blades won't shave the ice properly," Tink answered. "And the blades tend to get stuck."

"What about a squirrel wheel?"

"Nope, same problem."

"What about a smaller grater?"

"That's the smallest one the humans make," Tink said. "I checked with Lizzie."

Periwinkle sighed again. Her eyes glanced around the room inspecting each of Tink's collected "lost things" searching for some measure of inspiration. Tink's ego was bruised. The blonde was the best tinker talent in Pixie Hollow and she prided herself on being able to fix or invent almost anything. Not being to "fix" Lord Milori's problem was clearly eating at her.

Peri's gaze danced around the room bouncing across thimbles, combs, the bristles of a hairbrush, a pair of screws, an empty spool, several paper clips, three safety pins and an assortment of other items which had been collecting dust in the confines of Tink's abode.

It had escaped her first pass but when Peri took inventory again she stopped at something greenish-white hanging in the closet. Closer inspection revealed it to be the winter parka Tinker Bell had sewn when she first ventured into the Winter Woods in violation of Pixie Hollow law.

Ever since Zarina had invented the winter talent pixie dust the winter overcoat had fallen into disuse and was covered in a thick layer of everyday dust, changing its color from green to nearly all white.

The little frost fairy stretched her lips into a warm smile as she remembered those lovely days when she first came face to face with the girl who she learned was her sister. Peri pointed out the coat and reminisced with Tink about those events.

Tinker Bell smiled happily, cherishing her Periwinkle's words and those wonderful memories.

"What a shame it can't so easy for Lord Milori," Peri commented.

"Hum? What was that?"

"It's a shame it can't be as easy as a coat so that Lord Milori can visit the warm seasons."

Tink eyed the warm overcoat. She turned her head one way, then the other. Her mind clearly at work.

"I wasn't serious, Tink," Peri said with a giggle.

Tinker Bell, though, wasn't listening. Then suddenly there was a spark.

"That's it, Peri!" Tink sounded, jumping to her feet. "We'll make Lord Milori a warm season coat. You're a genius!"

"I am? Wait, won't a coat make him hotter?"

"Not this one. We'll make it so that it keeps him cold when he visits the warm season," Tink gushed. "And it can fit through any door in the Pixie Dust Tree. I have a brilliant sister."

"Well what are we waiting for," Peri engendered. "Let's get started."


	4. Chapter 4

**4.**

* * *

The new coat Tinker Bell had envisioned was going to take a great deal of work. She not only accepted the help of Periwinkle but also enlisted her friends who were all too eager to let Lord Milori and Queen Clarion be together like any ordinary couple.

The girls started by a building an inner lining made with fabric waterproofed with spider silk and a thin layer of tree sap. The lining was filled with sawdust and then stitched throughout with a complex diamond pattern intended to capture the sawdust and prevent it from sinking to the bottom of the coat.

Large and deep pockets insulated with the same sawdust were sewn in to contain sheets of ice to keep Lord Milori cool. The outer shell was made of the same material that was used to make Tink's winter parka. Because of her artistic sensibility and impeccable fashion sense Rosetta was asked to try on the coat.

"Well, what do you think?" Tinker Bell asked.

"It's bulky, it's heavy and it itches," Rosetta answered. "And couldn't you find a different color? This drab grey isn't very inviting if you know what I mean."

"This is just the prototype," Tink explained. "It has a long way to go before it's finished."

"So, what's next?" Vidia asked.

"We need someone who can test it out for us," Tink said.

"I know just the sparrow man," Rosetta cooed.

 **~O~**

"Now remember, Sled, this is a surprise so don't breathe a word of this," Rosetta instructed her beau. Sled was to wear the coat around the warm seasons while he was still a winter fairy. Plenty of ice would be made available to aide him in his testing.

It didn't take long before his critique was ready. The coat was heavy on its own. The ice only added to the extra weight. "My shoulders started to hurt in less than an hour," he told the girls. Worse yet, the sheets of ice restricted his range of motion. When he tried to bend or lean over the ice refused to let him move. When he forced the issue, the ice broke. One shard even pierced the watertight lining and poked him in the stomach.

"I like the idea, Tink, but to be honest I don't think this is going to work," he told her. "Not without lots of changes."

Deflated but not disheartened Tinker Bell soldiered on. Using Sled's review she went back to her drawing board and redesigned everything from the ground up. Instead of a bulky, oversized coat she developed a special vest and leggings. The sawdust was retained but instead of deep pockets for bulky sheets of ice she developed a series of tiny, watertight pouches that were sewn into the liner. The pouches were arranged to allow for the greatest range of movement.

Halfway during development Tinker Bell made a small but crucial change. She decided to mix some of the sawdust into the water. Tink reasoned that putting insulation into the water would keep everything frozen longer. Rigorous testing proved her right. "Now Lord Milori won't have to refreeze the water as often," she noted.

Taking some advice from Rosetta the inner shell was lined with rose petals to mitigate the itching. The outer shell was tinted a pale, ice blue color that was chosen specifically to complement the Lord of Winter's pupils.

"No woman can resist a man when his clothes brings out the color of his eyes," Rosetta crooned. "Queen Clarion will be smitten all over again when she sees him wearing this smart outfit."

After much testing (with Sled again as the guinea pig) she presented the final version to her friends for inspection. "Now whenever Lord Milori visits Pixie Hollow he can stay cool. And when the ice starts to melt he just has to use his own winter powers to freeze it over again."

The coat was cut for a comfortable fit that hugged Milori's handsome physique. Vidia pointed out that Milori's good wing would still be exposed to the heat of the warm seasons. "The vest isn't long enough to protect them."

"Oh, I took care of that," Periwinkle smiled. "Lord Milori has worn a cape for as long as I can remember. So I devised one to protect his wings. With a little help from my sister."

"Hey, it was your idea," Tink protested, beaming with pride at Peri's ingenuity.

"What are we all waiting for?" Iridessa chimed in. "Let's go present this to Lord Milori."

 **~O~**

Rather than get Queen Clarion's hopes up needlessly, the girls went to the Winter Woods first. They wanted to offer Lord Milori time to try it on and become comfortable with it. The small group of fairies arrived at the library where they encountered the Keeper at his desk. He was mumbling to himself about his next volume of historical texts.

"Dewey, do you know where we can find Lord Milori?" Periwinkle asked of him.

"What? Oh the Lord Milori is inspecting the northern mountains on his owl," he answered them. Noticing the peculiar article of clothing in Tink's arm he set down his quill and flittered towards them. "What do you have there, if you don't mind me asking?"

"It's a coat for Lord Milori," Tinker Bell told him. "Well, really a vest. We made it especially so that he can visit the warm seasons just like everyone else."

"A coat? For the warm seasons? How does that work?"

Periwinkle and the other girls all chimed in explaining everything to the curious historian. Once he realized just how important this invention was he started writing everything down, asking questions to commit every detail to posterity.

"Oh, future generations are going to look back on this era as a golden age of invention," he told his visitors. "So this vest actually works?"

"Yes," Silvermist confirmed. "Sled helped us test it."

Fawn chuckled. "He spent a whole day helping me train the bunnies to hop around the meadow. He never felt warm once, but boy did the oak pollen make him sneeze. Who knew he was so allergic?"

"Oh this is going to be so great for Lord Milori and Queen Clarion," Dewey exhorted. "It will be just like it was before."

All the girls were shocked by this slip and in unison spoke. "Before?"

"Wait, what do you mean 'before'? Are you telling us that Pixie Hollow used to be different?" Tinker Bell asked.

"Uh oh. Now I've gone and done it. O-oh, Lord Milori is going to kill me."


	5. Chapter 5

**5.**

* * *

"O-oh, now you can't be saying anything to Lord Milori or Queen Clarion," Dewey pleaded. He looked terribly nervous to the girls. His voice quivered with terror, he was jittery and if Periwinkle didn't know better she would say his skin appeared cold and clammy.

"Say what?" Tinker Bell asked.

The Keeper turned, facing away from them. His jittering stopped and he seemed to compose himself. He faced them again and then with narrowed eyes said, "You have to promise to never breathe a word of this anyone. You can't even discuss this amongst yourselves, is that clear?"

Tinker Bell and Periwinkle swiveled around, silently taking a roll call of their friends. "It's agreed," Peri said, nodding with her sister. "We promise never to speak of this again."

"Okay. You know the story of how Queen Clarion and Lord Milori met," he began. "But there was a bit more to it."

 **~O~**

When Clarion was just a princess she met the handsome Lord of Winter and was almost immediately attracted to him. It was entirely superficial at first, but they more they got to know each other the more they fell deeply in love and wanted to spend time with each other. At first the young couple met at the border between Spring and Winter at sunset every evening.

However, Milori was more than eager to delve into Clarion's world. He was fascinated by the colors, the animals and even the warmth on the other side. But he couldn't, of course. A winter fairy could not live in the warm seasons just like a warm fairy couldn't live in the cold season.

Then one day he got a brilliant idea. Spring and Summer were too warm for him to enter. But the Autumn Forest was different. It was cooler there and he could survive in that environment for short periods of time. His first attempt was a success. It was just half an hour, but he never felt weak nor did his wings sag.

Soon Milori began making several sojourns into the Autumn Forest to be with his lady love. However, Milori's desire to see the rest of Pixie Hollow never abated and it wasn't before he wanted to visit the other seasons. Clarion begged him not to for fear that he might lose his wings, but Milori concluded that short visits would not do any harm.

Indeed, it seemed at first that his assumption was correct. The two spent several brief but purely romantic moments visiting the Spring Meadow and later the Summer Gardens. Unfortunately, one fateful day the pair lost track of time and remained too long in Spring. Once Clarion and Milori noticed it was too late. Lord Milori broke a wing and soon after the law was put into place that kept the warm and winter seasons apart.

 **~O~**

"Wow!" Fawn breathed, recovering from the intense story.

To help tell the tale Dewey had employed the magic of yellow Pixie Dust which the Keeper was able to command. He formed glowing constructs to enhance his presentation and clarify details too demanding or tedious to relay through mere words. His vivid imagination helped to create intensely detailed images which expertly conveyed the burgeoning love between the two regents. He also created some of the most heartbreaking images as Milori lost his wing and the two had to say goodbye for what they thought would be the last time.

Rosetta cried and Silvermist pouted as they watched the desperate love fall apart thanks to one ill-advised journey into the Spring Meadow. Even Vidia, the irascible member of the group, was moved by Dewey's expert storytelling.

"When the border was reopened this secret was kept in place to prevent other winter fairies from doing the very same thing," Dewey explained.

Iridessa, who like the others was held spellbound by the tale shook it off and pointed out the rather glaring hole in Dewey's reasoning. "Why is this still a secret?" she asked. "Now that Zarina has made it possible for just about anyone to cross the border safely isn't this a moot point?"

The Keeper blinked with surprise. Then she smiled. Then he laughed. "Oh ho-ho so it is. Well, since neither Lord Milori nor Queen Clarion can benefit from Zarina's latest alchemy you should respect their privacy. This is still a very painful moment for them."

"We understand," Tink said with a nod.

"They shouldn't have to relive that moment over and over again," Periwinkle agreed.

"No one will say one word about to anyone. Right guys?"

All eyes turned towards one fairy in particular. Silvermist. "Why is everyone looking at me?"

"Don't say one word, Sil," Vidia scolded.

"I won't," the water talent stated. "Not one word."

"Good."

"Wait a minute," Rosetta interrupted. "Sil, this doesn't mean you can say more than one word. You have to remain absolutely silent about this."

"Of course I know what it means," Silvermist replied, both hurt and angry. "I will say nothing."

"No miming, either," Fawn added.

"Or singing," Iridessa continued.

"Or shadow puppets," Vidia said.

"Or water constructs," Tinker Bell amended.

"Or…"

"I get it, I get it," Silvermist complained. "Sheesh. I reveal one little secret through interpretive dance and suddenly I'm undependable."

"And no ice or frost storytelling," Periwinkle added, making sure to cover all the bases. After all, Silvermist was now able to transform into any winter talent with Zarina's talent altering dust.

Suddenly the light which filtered through the ice ceiling from above was blotted out for a brief second. Dewey announced that Lord Milori had returned. The shadow they saw was his owl flying overhead. "Now why don't you all go take this wonderful vest to Lord Milori, I'm sure he'll be most impressed with your ingenuity."

"Ooh that's right. We forgot all about the vest," Rosetta chimed in with a bright and cheery look on her face. "Come on, girls. Lord Milori won't stand still for long."

The girls raced out of the library raising a racket like a gaggle of excitable geese. When the door shut behind them Dewey let out a huge sigh of relief. _Oh I hated to lie to them_ , he thought. _But it's for their own good. They are all such nice girls. I would hate to see anything bad to happen to them._

 _Or me._


	6. Chapter 6

**6.**

* * *

"Queen Clarion?" the meek voice said, barely carrying across the large rotunda of the Pixie Dust Tree.

The queen, glowing in all her royal finery, gently spun around and faced the tiny voice. It was Zarina the Pixie Dust Alchemist. She was flanked by the sisters Tinker Bell and Periwinkle. Along with them were Tink's usual group of friends: Rosetta, Fawn, Silvermist, Vidia and Iridessa and Periwinkle's best friends Gliss and Spike.

"Oh my, what is this an uprising?" Clarion said in jest. Her ministers, with whom she was consulting, could barely suppress their amusement.

"Wha-? Oh no. We have a present for you," Zarina stated with a smile too big for her face.

"Can it wait, dear? As you can see we have some important business that requires our attention."

"Uh, well, not exactly. Tink finished what I started."

"What do you mean?" the regent asked.

The group of young fairy friends parted and in walked a sparrow man so familiar to Clarion that her heart skipped a beat. "Oh my," she gasp, her breath slipping through her rose colored lips as if drawn out by some unseen force. What she saw that caused her such discomposure was Lord Milori. He was wearing some unusual looking vest which was stitched with a tiny diamond shaped pattern all around. It fit him like a glove, accentuating his strong physique and broad shoulders, the color even matched his eyes perfectly. The man never looked so handsome.

"Hello, my love," he said with a longing smile.

"Milori. How… how can you be here?"

He answered by taking her hand and placing it upon his firm, manly chest. She touched the diamond shaped pattern and was surprised by what she felt.

"It's cool. Almost cold."

"Yes, and it is all thanks to Tinker Bell and Periwinkle," he said.

Stunned, the queen looked at the fraternal sisters who took it as their cue to explain what they had wrought. Everything including their original idea for a coat which then morphed into this vest, leggings and cape was thrown in to their story. It was an amazing tale of ingenuity and moments of sudden enlightenment which they spun.

When they were through Clarion never looked so happy. "You did it," she could barely say, her voice quivered with equal parts excitement and disbelief. "You made our dreams come true." Drops of water appeared in the corner of her eyes and slowly trickled down her cheek. She put her hands on his chest, his shoulders and even his face as if making sure he really was here. Clarion needed assurance that this was not some lovely dream in the middle of the night. She needed it to be real, and it was much to her amazement and relief.

Milori put his arm around her tiny waist and pulled her close. "I'm really here," he whispered.

"Yes. Yes you are." Clarion almost fell into joyous tears as the reality of this moment sunk in.

Milori then leaned over and placed a gentle but loving peck on Clarion's cheek. She blushed. "Would you care to take an owl ride across Pixie Hollow with me?" he asked in a pleasingly romantic voice.

"Without hesitation," she breathed, her bosom heaving at his mere presence. Rosetta commented that she they were silently flirting with each other.

"Ahem," Hyacinth coughed. "Your Highness, we do have a tight schedule to keep."

"Why don't you keep it for me, Minister," she told the fidgety advisor. Clarion then turned to Milori and with a painful smile of so many lost years stated, "We don't want to keep that poor owl waiting, now would we?"

"Certainly not," Milori grinned.

The girls, joined by the ministers, watched as Milori aided Clarion onto his faithful Snowy Owl, the only one to wear a special necklace. The large, white feathered Bubo scandiacus flapped its wings and it silently lifted into the air taking both regents on a tour of Pixie Hollow, though sightseeing was in all likelihood the last thing on either of their minds.

Periwinkle was the first, then Rosetta and then the others followed. Each of the young pixies, save for Vidia, squealed with sheer delight. Vidia, who thought herself to "grown up" for such girlish displays, still smiled broadly and celebrated with the others.

"Zarina, Periwinkle, Tinker Bell, you've done it," Snowflake, the Minister of Winter stated. "The three of you have done what none thought possible. You have united Pixie Hollow. We are now whole. And to commemorate this grand achievement we should hold a celebration. A great festival with dancing, drinking and feasting like our world has never before seen."


	7. Chapter 7

**7.**

* * *

"A celebration! I can't believe we're going to have a celebration!" Rosetta squealed. "Oh, I'm going to debut my new dress. Sled and I are going to have matching clothes."

A slick smirk came across Fawn's lips. "Wow, I didn't know Sled looked good in a dress."

The other girls burst out into peals of laughter. Rosetta, however, was not quite amused. Until she pictured her beau in a flower petal garment like her own. Then even she nearly bust a gut laughing.

The flight to the Pixie Dust Tree, as an escort to Lord Milori on his trusted owl, had been filled with a dizzying anticipation. Everyone save for Vidia squealed at least once at what was about to transpire. The moment of truth was more satisfying than anyone could predict. Now that the royal lovers had been reunited the flight away from the great maple tree was a pleasingly joyful one.

"Let's not forget why we're having the celebration in first place," Iridessa reminded everyone.

"Yeah! Did you see the look on Queen Clarion's face?" Tink asked her friends, a giddy tremble to her voice. "She never looked so happy."

"They are so in love," Silvermist correctly observed. "It's a shame they ever had to be apart in the first place."

"What a terrible tragedy," Periwinkle commented wistfully. "And they hid it so well."

"Yeah, no one knew how broken their hearts were," Silvermist analyzed.

"We were all fooled," Vidia said. "But it's over now and Clarion and Milori can make up for lost time."

Then Tinker Bell stopped suddenly. "Hey guys, what if they never had to be apart?"

"Uh, Tink, that's not possible," Fawn reminded her.

"Yeah, that would mean going back in time. No one in Pixie Hollow has that kind of talent," Zarina said.

"Uh oh, she's got that look again," Rosetta pointed out. The expression was a distinctive one. Everyone recognized it. This was the same look she wore when Tink was building that first snow machine. And it was the same countenance she always got on her face whenever she was about to do something that Queen Clarion would absolutely not approve of.

"What?" Tinker Bell asked, trying to look like the picture of innocence.

"You're planning something," the light fairy observed, "and whatever it is it can't be good."

Tinker Bell then plead her case. "It just hit me. Remember when Dewey told us about how Lord Milori broke his wing? He was almost terrified. I don't think that was the secret he wasn't supposed to tell us."

"You mean he lied to us?" Silvermist concluded.

"No, not lied exactly. More like misdirected," Tinker Bell deduced. "I think he told us one secret to avoid revealing another one."

"Tink, you're reaching," Vidia cautioned.

"He did order us not to discuss it even amongst ourselves," Periwinkle remembered.

Silvermist gasped. "Oh no, we're going to get into trouble just for talking about it."

"Oh, that's not going to happen, sugar plumb," Rosetta told Silvermist who immediately seemed relieved.

"Now that you mention it, that is kind of strange," Spike concluded. "Why would he say that?" Spike asked.

"To keep Tinker Bell from doing what she's thinking," Vidia astutely observed. "She isn't one to follow the rules, in case you haven't noticed."

"Tink, sometimes secrets are meant to remain secret," Iridessa cautioned.

"You mean like the sister I didn't know I had?" Tink asked while glancing over at Periwinkle. "Was that supposed to remain a secret?"

"This is different," Vidia chided. "This doesn't involve you. Leave well enough alone."

"But it _does_ involves the happiness of our queen," Tink implored. "We have to do something."

Tinker Bell looked over her friends, effectively taking a silent poll. Disappointingly, none seemed willing to accept her premise or go along with her plan. Only her own sister, Periwinkle, appeared to offer any kind of support and even that was with some reservation. The little tinker fairy was truly dismayed. "Oh c'mon guys. When was the last time I steered you wrong?"

Vidia cocked a wicked eyebrow and replied, "Would you like that alphabetically or chronologically?"

Tinker Bell crossed her arms in disgust and gave a haughty huff in response to Vidia's comment. Then she continued, "Well why else would Dewey act that way?"

Rosetta then took a moment to plead her own case. "Look, Tink, I think Dewey just wants to give Queen Clarion and Lord Milori their privacy. To me, there is no deeper secret here."

"I'm up for a good adventure as much as anyone else," Fawn began, "but this smells like a dead end to me. I'm sorry, Tink. Count me out."

"Same here," Vidia stated before flitting away. The other girls all agreed with Fawn and Vidia. Periwinkle, who didn't want to voice any objections, still had a look on her face that spoke volumes. She didn't think there was much here, either.

The last to say goodbye was Rosetta, who offered some words of consolation. "Tink, I know all you want to do is help Queen Clarion and Lord Milori. But you already have. And you made them so very happy. Why can't you just be satisfied with what you've accomplished?"

Tink sighed. "Because, Rosetta, something doesn't quite add up, and as a tinker I can't let that go."

"Why don't you talk to Fairy Mary," Rosetta suggested. "She and Queen Clarion are close friends. If anyone can clear this up to your satisfaction she can."

Tink's face brightened. "Yeah. You're right. Thanks, Ro."

Rosetta took hold of Tink's arm before the young fairy could flitter off. "Just don't get yourself into any trouble, okay?"

"I promise," Tinker Bell replied. Rosetta released the girl and she immediately flew off to meet with the tinker guild supervisor, emboldened.

Rosetta, however, was not so cheery. "Why do I have a hard time believing that? I better round up the others, this could get messy."


	8. Chapter 8

**8.**

* * *

"Why didn't you tell me?" Fairy Mary irately asked. "I wanted to be there to see the look on Queen Clarion's beautiful face."

Tinker Bell, on the advice of Rosetta, had come to ask her guild overseer for some guidance. Before she could utter a word Fairy Mary instantly got right into her face. Tink had no idea that Mary would want to be party to the reveal, but it now made so much sense. Fairy Mary and Queen Clarion were the closest of friends. Now she mentally kicked herself for not thinking of it sooner.

"What happened?" Mary asked.

"She was… speechless," Tinker Bell said, trying to remember something that was rather foggy in her mind. The moment had just passed yet she was so caught up in that powerful moment that she had a hard time remembering details.

"Anything else?"

"Yes, it was like they both fell in love all over again," Tink described. "They couldn't take their eyes off each other."

Fairy Mary leapt for joy and spun happily in the air. "Oh, I knew it. I knew it. And I missed it." She sighed. "Oh listen to me prattle on about myself. At least Ree is happy?"

"Ree?"

"Oh, sorry." Fairy Mary blushed. "It's a nickname for Queen Clarion. Only I or Lord Milori can use it, though. No one else. So don't repeat it."

"Not one word. But now that you mention it..."

Mary did not hearing this. She wrinkled up her face and glared at her best tinker fairy. "Not even your friends!"

"Of course not. Bu-u-t, Dewey said the same thing when he accidentally let something slip about Milori in the warm seas-."

She couldn't even finish her sentence when Fairy Mary swept back into Tink's face, equal parts frantic and terrified. "What did he say? WHAT DID HE SAY?!" Mary had grabbed Tinker Bell by the shoulders and was shaking her wildly while questioning the girl. "Tell me _exactly_ what you heard."

"Uh, he just explained how Lord Milori lost his wing," she replied, a huge and phony grin on her face. "You know, that he ventured deeper and deeper into the Autumn Forest where it was cooler so he could be with Queen Clarion. But then one day he spent a little too much time in a warmer season and it caused his wing to break."

"Is that all?" Mary asked suspiciously, still looking very much on edge.

Tinker Bell had to think about that for a moment. Seeing Fairy Mary's response was unsettling. It immediately confirmed her suspicions. There was a much deeper secret here, but was it really worth pursuing? That terrified look on the guild master's face certainly suggested that it was. Tinker Bell needed to learn more, however. She took a calculated risk, not knowing exactly how deep she might find herself. Of course, this wasn't new territory for her. Getting in over her head was pretty much a normal day for her.

"Well, in reference to the vest, he did say that it was going to be like it was before, whatever that means."

Fairy Mary gasped. "Oh no. Is that all he said?"

To Tinker Bell's shock there were tears welling up in Mary's eyes. If Tinker Bell didn't know any better she might have thought that Fairy Mary had just lost someone close to her.

"Yes. It probably just means that Lord Milori can visit for extended stretches like he did before," Tink said, partially lying. "Because now he can visit for long stretches with the vest. Just like he did when going into the Autumn Forest."

A weak smile and faint laugh came from Fairy Mary. "Oh yes. Yes, of course. What else could it mean? Now you listen to me, Tinker Bell. You are not speak a word of this anyone. You should not have even mentioned it to me. And whatever you do, say nothing to Queen Clarion, Lord Milori or any of the Ministers."

"Huh? Why?"

"Uh…, uh, well…, it would hurt Queen Clarion's feelings." It was so obvious Fairy Mary was lying to her. Unfortunately, this shed almost no new light on what was being covered up. Only that it struck fear into the likes of both The Keeper of All Fairy Knowledge and Fairy Mary.

Curious. So very curious.


	9. Chapter 9

**9.**

* * *

That wasn't precisely the reaction Tinker Bell was expecting from her guild supervisor. Or maybe it was? Either way, the little blonde fairy with the insatiable curiosity had a difficult decision to make. This ran deeper than she could have possibly imagined. There was a concerted effort by high ranking fairies to keep this a secret. And both Dewey and Mary ordered her not to mention this to Queen Clarion.

Maybe this went all the way up to the queen? But why?

"What to do? What to do?" she muttered to herself.

"You talk to your friends, that's what," Vidia said.

"Dyah!" The tinker fairy was taken entirely off guard. She had been meandering towards home deep in thought when she absent mindedly came across her sister and their mutual associates. "Wha-?"

"Periwinkle, Vidia and I overheard your conversation with Fairy Mary," Rosetta confessed. "I guess you were right."

"Yeah, there is something bigger going on," Fawn said as an apology.

"I'm in," Iridessa said.

"Me, too," Silvermist added.

"What's our next course of action?" Vidia asked.

"Uh, maybe we shouldn't do this," Tinker Bell stated, meekly.

"Huh? Ten minutes ago you were the eager beaver no one could stop," Vidia questioned. "What changed?"

Tinker Bell explained her theory. "This cover up could go all the way up to the crown. How can we get around Queen Clarion?"

"I think I can help with that," Periwinkle said. She stood front and center and explained what she knew. "Deep in the main library is a section that is off limits to everyone except the Keeper and Pixie Hollow royalty."

Dewey had explained to her once that those books were aging texts. Contained within was the collected ancient history of Pixie Hollow, information that was irreplaceable if lost. Despite being made of ice, the pages had become very brittle so those ancient texts were secured until Dewey could make useable duplicates.

"We could go in at night, when everyone is asleep. If we're careful…"

"…if we're careful we can learn what this secret is," Gliss excitedly finished.

"Yeah, just one problem," Spike interjected. "If this really does go all the way up to the crown, we become criminals. I don't know about you, but I would rather not live the rest of my life in a jail cell. Especially since we live _such a long time_."

"Maybe this is a cover up of necessity," Zarina speculated.

"What do you mean?" Iridessa asked.

"Maybe what's scaring everyone is something that is a threat to all of Pixie Hollow," Zarina said. "That could explain why the queen might be involved. She is protecting us, all of us."

"Well that's a better reason not to get involved," Spike returned.

"Sure, but if we can find a solution then it helps secure Pixie Hollow and relieves Queen Clarion of that burden," Zarina countered.

"And it can make all of us heroes," Silvermist gushed. "Not that being a hero is important. Because, well, we have been before. Heroes, I mean. And it feels pretty good. But it would make us heroes again. Not that it is important to me, or anything."

"Don't strain yourself," Vidia said with a sarcastic note to her smoky voice.

Tinker Bell took all of this in. She considered each of the opposing positions voiced by her friends as well as her own silent counsel. When she was younger doing this would have been so much easier. She was more of a loner. Now that had all changed. She had a sister and Tinker Bell was very attached to her friends. Friends who wanted to come and share the risk with her, but it meant putting them in harm's way. Could she do that one more time?

Then there was Terence, the cute dust keeper sparrow man she was sweet on, though Tink was a bit too self-conscious to admit it to him. If things went sour Terence would never know, and any chance of a relationship would could to an immediate end. And of course, there was Fairy Mary and Queen Clarion. Their opinions mattered so very much to Tinker Bell. She didn't want to disappoint either of them.

But solving difficult problems was precisely what she did. And if this secret had a solution, and if she and her friends could devise a satisfactory one, it could mean a safer Pixie Hollow. In this scenario the rewards would greatly outweigh the risks. Of course, that line of reasoning only held true if the secret were a situation that demanded a resolution. If she and her friends were wrong and they got caught, it would probably guarantee a hard life for everyone.

Tinker Bell turned to face her friends. "Okay, I'll do it, but there will be some rules."

"Rules?" Rosetta asked, looking confused.

Tinker Bell expounded on her decision. First, everyone had to agree to do this. Tinker Bell refused to speak for anyone else. Second, if even one person balked, then this endeavor would end here and now and no one was to speak of it again. Third, no matter the consequences whether good or bad everyone had to face it together. And last, once fully committed they had to see it through to the very end. This business could not be left unfinished.

"What do you say?"

"Isn't that the way it always is," Vidia asked snidely.

"Yes, but this time I want firm commitments," Tink answered. "We might be facing something we can't fix."

The girls all looked at each other, as if in silent communication. Then, one by one, each fairy friend answered in the affirmative. All that is, with one exception. Iridessa.

"I think that once we discover what this secret is we should have another poll," she suggested. "That way we can decide if we want to go through with it or not."

"I'm sorry, Dess," Tink replied. "This is the point of no return."

The jittery light fairy sighed. She peered into the pleading eyes of her friends. Gliss stepped forward and whispered, "You'll be doing something that will make Lord Milori and Queen Clarion very happy."

"Or very angry," she countered. She thought some more before rendering her final decision. "Okay, I'm in. But only so I can keep the rest of you out of trouble."

Gliss happily embraced the warm fairy with a muted cheer.

"Okay, we meet at the border at midnight," Tinker Bell instructed. "Then we proceed to the library. Fawn, you and Gliss will be the lookouts. The rest of us will go through those books looking for clues. We'll have to be quick, but careful. Together we can do this. I have faith."


	10. Chapter 10

**10.**

* * *

Slipping into the library under cover of night was even easier to do than say. The most difficult moment came when several of the warm fairies, now transformed into frost talents, nearly slid on the ice and into the sleeping form of Fiona, Dewey's pet Lynx. For Tinker Bell, it was an odd moment of déjà vu.

The archives were down the main hall. Here the Keeper maintained the definitive history of Pixie Hollow. Periwinkle led the way. The ancient texts were stored neatly in an alcove where Dewey was attempting to both restore and duplicate these aging tomes. Before proceeding, Periwinkle made sure to caution her friends to be as quiet as possible. "Dewey lives in a room off this main hall. He might hear us if he decides to stay up late."

Dewey sometimes found himself so immersed in his work that he would sometimes neglect to keep track of time and wouldn't get to sleep until early the next morning. Tinker Bell could relate.

Using only the glow from their dust laden wings the girls began the labor intensive process of searching, page by page, through these brittle old books for anything that might shed light on the mystery they had inadvertently stumbled into.

The process took longer than expected. No one had anticipated that these ancient books would be written in an early version of the fairy language that was at once both familiar yet foreign. Their language had evolved over time, as all languages eventually do. Definitions, context, syntax and even grammar had all changed to some degree or another since these words had been written.

Altering everyone into Scribe talents would have made this easier as any scribe would have a much easier time understanding these archaic writings. Unfortunately, Scribe was primarily a warm weather talent. Even if Zarina had thought to bring some her transforming dust, it would have been useless in the Winter Season. This meant that deciphering the ancient language of the fairies would be a slow proposition filled with lots of trial and error.

As they proceeded, the girls came across a number of Pixie Hollow's rather harmless secrets. This was knowledge which had simply fallen into disuse and could only be found in these dilapidated texts. These included such things as the origins of Pixie Dust (a magic dove and her egg were involved); the first contact with Peter Pan; and even the beginnings of fairies themselves.

"'When the first baby laughed for the first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies,'" Rosetta told the others, reading from one of the books. "So that's where we come from. Amazing"

"Yeah, amazing. Don't get distracted," Vidia scolded.

"Didn't you ever want to know?"

"Under different circumstances that would be truly fascinating," Iridessa replied, her voice in a hushed tone to avoid waking Dewey who slept just down the hall. "But right now we have to focus on the task."

"I wouldn't mind hearing about it later, Ro," Tinker Bell said. To the little tinker fairy, this wasn't a repository of old and outdated books, it was a treasure of information which could inform her talent and open new avenues of tinkering and invention. She made a mental note to spend more time in the library with Periwinkle at some future date.

~O~

Gliss stood watch in the hallway alone. Fawn, who at one time been her companion as lookout, had been called inside the alcove to help the others find what they were looking for. That was more than two hours ago. Gliss, who was always a bundle of excitable energy, snuck around the main hall looking for anything that might indicate another person in the library.

Suddenly, she heard a noise. Dewey was shuffling around. "Oh now where did I leave my glasses," he muttered to himself.

Gliss raced back to the alcove to alert the others. "It's Dewey. He's coming this way."

Frantically the girls replaced every book they had taken from the shelves. Tinker Bell made sure each was in its proper place before joining others as they carefully hid, motionless, either behind or on top of the bookshelves. Dewey entered the room, a yawn indicating how tired he was. "Now where could they be?"

The Keeper searched the tables and shelves for his missing spectacles. The fairies cautiously and silently snuck around him as he stumbled around half awake. "I know those accursed glasses are around here somewhere," he yawned.

Fawn spied a glint of light. She tapped her companion, Rosetta the Garden Fairy. "Look," she whispered, pointing. Stuck within the folds of Rosetta's rose petal dress were Dewey's glasses. He had indeed left them in this room and had somehow become attached. The redhead carefully dislodged the specs from her clothing and handed them to Fawn. "Now what do we do," she mouthed to the animal fairy.

Fawn just shrugged.

"Hey. Hey," someone overhead ever so faintly whispered. Rosetta and Fawn looked up and found Spike laying atop the bookshelf. She pointed to a table where Dewey could find them. Unfortunately, he was right next to it. They would be found out, as well.

"That won't work," Fawn mouthed back.

"You got a better idea?!" Spike angrily whispered in return.

Then, to everyone's relief, Dewey casually floated away from the desk.

"Go. Go!" Spike urged them with a wave of her arms. Fawn and Rosetta crept out from their hiding place and reached out to place the glasses when suddenly Dewey stopped. He hovered before a bookshelf in a dark corner. Barely awake the Keeper tapped his walking stick on the ground two times and the room instantly seemed to come to life with a low rumble that shook everything. Fawn, Rosetta and all the other fairies watched in dumbstruck awe as the seemingly plain bookshelf swung open revealing the entrance to a dark, hidden chamber concealed behind it.


	11. Chapter 11

**11.**

* * *

Dewey stood before the entrance to the hidden room. Gliss was so astonished that she let out a tiny "Eeeep!" and had to be stifled by Vidia and Zarina so she wouldn't give away the girls' presence in the room. Tinker Bell and her partners in this endeavor watched this strange sight both curiously and cautiously. Periwinkle began to feel sick to her stomach. It was a gnawing sense of betrayal that was eating away at her. Tinker Bell felt it, as well. Both considered Dewey a dear friend.

Just as the Keeper was about to enter the hidden chamber he scratched his temples as if in thought and felt something atop his head. "Oh ho, so that's where I left them," he said, pulling down a pair of spectacles that had been propped up on the crown of his head the whole time.

Fawn looked down at the pair she held in her hand. If he had his glasses all along then what were these? A spare set, she reasoned.

Dewey the Keeper, turned and floated out of the room, talking to his glasses as if they were wayward children. "Now don't you be doin' that to me again. You gave me a good fright, you know."

Gliss peered out of the alcove and watched as the Keeper made his way slowly down the corridor and back into his private quarters. Once she was certain the area was clear she gave a signal and her friends emerged from their impromptu hiding places.

"I don't believe it," Tinker Bell sputtered as she stared at the secret door. "It was under our noses the whole time."

"I wonder what's hidden inside," Rosetta asked rhetorically.

"Hurry, let's find out," Tinker Bell beckoned. She whisked her sister into the room, the others quickly following. Inside they were greeted with the most improbable scenario any could have imagined.

"A storage closet?" Periwinkle said, confused.

The secret chamber was nothing more than a closet, carved from ice, which stored more than a few inkwells, boxes of fresh writing plumes, numerous bindings for new books and several dozen stacks of parchment made from plant fibers. The materials were components used to complete books which would become part of the warm season library.

"Great! We're going to jail for breaking into a printing closet. Nice going, Tink!" Vidia said caustically.

The wings on the back of the little, blonde tinker fairy drooped with disappointment. What had she done? Did she assume too much? Yet something refused to be silent in her mind. There were still questions unanswered.

Rosetta put a consoling hand on the young girl's shoulders. "Don't let Vidia get to you, Tinker Bell. We all agreed to do this on our own. It's not your fault."

"You're wrong, Rosetta," she replied faintly, a bitter and defeated tone to her voice. "I let my curiosity get the best of me and in doing so put everyone here at risk. It _is_ my fault. All of it. When will I ever learn? But... I just don't understand why…" Her voice trailed off as if deep in thought. Painful thought.

"Why don't we go home?" Rosetta told her. "We could all use some sleep before sunrise. And besides, I feel a draft."

Rosetta stepped from the closet and joined her friends who were preparing to leave. They began to speak among themselves, using slight whispers so as not to be heard by their friend in the hidden room.

Just then Tinker Bell's head perked up. "Ro, what did you just say?"

"Uh…, I said I wanted to go so I can get some shuteye."

"No. Before that." Instantly Tink's mind was set racing again. "You felt a draft. Where?"

"Around my ankles," she answered. She then turned to the others and explained, "I have very delicate feet, you know."

"Tinker Bell? What are you doing?" Vidia asked, clearly miffed.

The blonde tinker fairy wasn't listening. Instead she put her hand to the floor. "There's more to this room," she answered.

The other girls just sighed. Iridessa even groaned, muttering, "Not again."

"No look!" Tinker Bell took a sheet of parchment and held it near the ground. To everyone's surprise it rippled and flapped. "Air is leaking out from behind this wall. Isn't that most peculiar?"

"Yeah, real peculiar. Can we go home now?" Spike snidely responded.

Tinker Bell searched the wall with her eyes and hands, looking for something. When she pressed against the shelving it shuddered. Pushing with greater force the wall fell backwards slightly. She then pressed harder and a loud sound of something unlocking followed. The others watched in amazement as the closet's side wall sunk deeper in the ice before sliding off to the side. Beyond it lay a tunnel, long and dark but here it was.

"Jackpot!" Tinker Bell celebrated.

"What the…?" Zarina asked. "Why put a secret door behind a secret door?"

"To fool anyone who might accidentally stumble across this closet," Tinker Bell exclaimed. "Now to find out why this is here and where it leads."


	12. Chapter 12

**12.**

* * *

On the wall of the dark tunnel were several light rattles. Each person who went in took one and shook it to activate the various components inside which luminesced when agitated. The tunnel, which was carved from the ice, descended below ground level and indeed further still until it finally reached a plateau. As far as anyone could see, the passageway went on indefinitely.

"Now what do we do?" Iridessa asked. Nerves rather than the cold bringing a shiver to her words.

Tinker Bell rubbed her temples. "We keep going. The tunnel looks more than tall enough. Let's fly."

 **~O~**

The journey never seemed to end. In fact Silvermist commented that it felt as if they had flown all the way across the Winter Woods. "It's just your imagination," Vidia said dismissively. Within moments mist began to form and the temperatures felt warmer than before.

"How is this here?" Fawn asked.

"We must be nearing the border and the warms seasons," Periwinkle answered.

Vidia could feel Silvermist's eyes boring into her backside. "Alright, alright. You told me so."

"Hey, look!" Gliss pointed out. "The tunnel is going up again."

"Finally," Iridessa breathed. "It must be close to sunrise by now."

Tink flew on into the mist as did several of the others, but Rosetta was more than hesitant. "Come on, Ro," Fawn told her.

"You go on without me," the garden fairy said, her hands nervously fidgeting with her perfectly combed red tresses. "That humidity is going to wreak havoc on my hair."

"ROSETTA!" the others shouted irately.

"Alright! Alright! But do you know how long it will take to brush this out?"

"Just go!" Vidia grumbled.

Rosetta proceeded into the muggy air, all the while complaining that she was going to end up with a bad case of the "frizzies."

 **~O~**

A few minutes of flying later Tinker Bell in the lead exited the icy passageway and found herself inside a large cavern with cathedral like ceilings punctuated by openings which acted like skylights. Iridessa was proven right in her earlier assessment, it was already daytime and brilliant streaks of early morning sunlight bathed the room in a warm and inviting glow.

The cave, unlike the tunnel, was made of stone. It was a natural feature as evidenced by the presence of stalactites hanging from above and stalagmites emerging from cavern floor. The eerie silence of the room was only occasionally broken by the unmistakable "plop" sound of dripping water, amplified by the cave's remarkable acoustics.

"Where are we?" Zarina asked.

Tinker Bell, once more, sought to find answers. In one direction was what appeared to be the mouth of the cave, which Fawn confirmed when she went off to take a quick look. "It's amazing. You can see all of Pixie Hollow from here," she reported. Then she added another surprise. "Guys, we're right on the border!"

"What did I say?" Rosetta screeched as she was the last to exit the ice tunnel. "Look at my hair. LOOK. AT. MY. HAIR. It's an absolute mess. Oh my head must look like a giant, red fur… fur… fur what in the world?" Her shrieking voice trailed off once her attention fixed upon the large cavern she had entered.

"This way," Periwinkle motioned. "I found something."

Deeper into the cave Tink and her fairy friends discovered an aging table with two chairs. Behind it, stacked on a counter and shelves carved from the rock, was the single most exquisite set of china ever seen in Pixie Hollow. Despite being covered by ages of dirt and dulled by time they still managed to be incredibly eye catching in their quiet dignity.

Stored inside a wooden box were dinner forks, salad forks, knives and spoons. This silverware was crafted to be a perfect accompaniment to the china plates and serving dishes. Amidst it all was a tea service painstakingly hammered out of the highest quality silver available. Artistically applied to the surface of the teapot was an image of the Pixie Dust Tree. Clearly this was used in the queen's private quarters. How it got here was another question which demanded an answer.

Tinker Bell approached round the table, which was fashioned from sturdy oak and was the undeniable centerpiece of this room. The edge, all around, was ornately and expertly carved with numerous scenes depicted in bas relief of every fairy talent both warm and cold. Each image showed a fairy engaged in some task representative of their guild.

Tinker Bell, who could most appreciate it, had to brush away layers of dust and spider webs to reveal the complexity of the designs. "Beautiful," she gasped. When she looked closer, Tinker Bell noticed that upon each scene were the coat of arms for the respective guild depicted. She stared in disbelief at the delicate and intricate nature of this exquisite body of work.

In her head she calculated how long it must have taken to complete such a table and what tools the artist must have used. Deep within her rich imagination was a vision of a tinker fairy, hunched over this fine piece of furniture, carefully evaluating which angle and how much force to use to scrape out the exact amount of wood with each tap or stroke and in such a precise way as to leave behind these perfect sculptures. "I wish I knew who made this," she said, weeping with unbridled admiration, "I could learn so much."

The tall chairs which accompanied the table were no less elaborately decorated. The quality of workmanship displayed in each chair was equal to that of the divinely adorned table. On the highest point on the seatback of one chair was the unmistakable coat of arms of the Queen of Pixie Hollow. Emblazoned within it was a unique coronet which identified it as belonging to Queen Clarion. The opposite chair also had a coat of arms but for the Lord of Winter. The coronet depicted clearly identified it as belonging to Lord Milori.

Rosetta, who among them was the most in tune with matters of the heart instantly recognized what this room was. "Oh dear. This is a private dining room," she said. "Just for Queen Clarion and Lord Milori. They must have come here in secret so they could be alone, away from the maddening duties of their difficult schedules."

Just from observing this room she could feel the tender and serene echoes of meals long ago shared between the two rulers. The dust and age of everything she saw also spoke of something else. Something more poignant and heartbreaking. At some point in the past, this room fell into disuse. And now here it remained, a forgotten landmark in the personal history of Queen Clarion and her one true love, Lord Milori.

"This room is filled with sadness," she told the others. "Can't you feel it? It's all around us. This was once a happy, loving place. Tender memories once lived here. Then something awful happened. And it became a terrible reminder, an open wound to the past which could no longer be. This room was abandoned. Now pain and sadness are all that remain. So much sadness."

"You can't be serious, Rosetta," Vidia replied in suspicious disbelief.

"Actually, she is quite right," a voice answered.

"Dyah!" they all shrieked. No one had expected another to join them. Moreover the voice they heard was all too familiar. "Oh no. It's her," Iridessa, upset and jittery, said to the others.

"Girls?"

Frightened, Tink and her friends slowly turned to face the other person in the room. It was none other than Queen Clarion.


	13. Chapter 13

**13.**

* * *

"Greetings, Your Majesty," Tinker Bell said with a sheepish grin on her face.

Silvermist then waved her hand and added, "So, how is your day?"

This provoked groans from the other girls. Tinker Bell face palmed while Vidia braced her head with her hands as if it were in excruciating agony from the sheer embarrassment.

Silvermist, confused, replied, "I was only trying to make small talk."

Fortunately, the queen seemed distracted to notice this absurd little scene. Instead, she looked wistfully at the room, gliding around and seeming to recall fond memories from so long ago. "I have not been here in such a long time. It seems as if it were a lifetime ago. Oh how I worked so diligently to try and forget this place."

Rosetta nudged the fairy next to her as if saying, _see, I was right_.

Tinker Bell, who was perpetually curious, stepped forward and in a meek voice asked. "Why?"

"Why? Why what?" Clarion replied.

"Why did you build this? And why abandon it?"

Clarions stopped in her tracks. The rush of crushing memories raced through her mind and she grabbed hold of Milori's chair with both hands as if to prop herself up. "Always full of questions, tinkers are," Clarion observed, this was clearly a weight on her shoulders. "Very well. Come with me."

 **~O~**

On the opposite side of the cavern wall where they entered was another passageway. This was dug out from the rock and soon descended into the earth of the warm seasons. Tinker Bell and all of her friends had to stop and sprinkle a pinch of Zarina's special dust upon themselves to transform from winter fairies back into their birth talents. The three frost fairies who were among them, Periwinkle, Gliss and Spike, each chose a warm talent dust so they could proceed. Periwinkle, as usual, chose tinker like her sister. Gliss, simply as a lark, chose water while Spike became a storm fairy saying it matched her attitude.

The passageway had been blocked by the overgrowth of roots from the trees which grew above them. Clarion, with a simple and graceful wave of her hand, commanded these roots to stand aside and suddenly the way was clear.

The flight to their new destination seemed to take longer than before. The fears in their hearts made the trip seem far worse than it actually was. No one spoke as the queen led the way. Each fairy, with Tinker Bell up front, followed one by one. Each person's mind focused not on what lay ahead, but on what their fate might be.

Finally they came upon a door. It slid open to another writing closet. This was made of wood and just like the other one where began their quest, this one contained copious amounts of ink wells, writing plumes, loose sheets of parchment and bindings to fix books. It seemed fitting.

Clarion shut the secret panel and then opened the double doors to a large rotunda filled with books upon level after level of shelves. At the center of the room was a lovely desk where one book was open and an entry was clearly in the process of being written.

"Where are we?" Tinker Bell asked quietly.

"This is my private study," Queen Clarion informed them. "Here I am undisturbed to think my deepest thoughts, to wax philosophical on the events of the day and contemplate any new laws presented to me by my advisors. I read, I write and when the spirit moves me, I may even giggle for no good reason other than it feels good. This is my sanctuary, my personal space guarded against the rigors of the outside world."

Fawn leaned over to Rosetta and whispered. "Gee, I just use the bathroom."

"I suppose it's time you learned the truth," the regent sighed. Clarion motioned to a couch filled with the most luxurious pillows. Tink and her friends sat and watched as the queen tapped on the giant double doors and one of her Helper Talents brought a tray with a tea service and crumpets. The ruler poured each girl a cup of hot tea and served each one a pastry to nibble on as she began her story.

"I was not always queen," she told them. "Upon arrival, a different queen ruled the land. Her name was Mab. She was at the end of her reign and I was the heir apparent, Princess Clarion. For the next several years I was to learn from Queen Mab, her advisors and the appointed instructors so I would be appropriately prepared to wear the crown upon her passing. I studied law, leadership, tactics and strategy, diplomacy, conflict resolution, philosophy and many other subjects necessary to make a wise ruler out of me.

"While a student I happened to meet a handsome young man named Milori who was himself a recent arrival and was also the Lord of Winter. At first I thought him a pompous oaf, however, as I more keenly observed him it became quite clear he was a good man with a generous heart. I fell in love. Surprisingly, he reciprocated those feelings. We began a proper courtship.

"Mab, however, disapproved. She strongly believed that marrying for love was dangerous. It made a regent weak and unable to lead. In her view such 'a useless and crippling emotion,' as she described it, only divided loyalties and in a crisis would force a leader to choose between her lover and her people. I ignored her advice and chose to continue. Mab would not allow it. She forbade me from ever seeing Lord Milori in any capacity except when dictated by my duties as heir apparent.

"She insisted that if I were to seek a mate she would choose one for me. I was forced into a prearranged marriage. The sparrow man she selected truly was a pompous oaf. I disliked him immediately and our engagement proceeded according to a schedule prescribed by Queen Mab herself. I was heartbroken and felt as if I was destined to lead an empty and unfulfilled life.

"A ray of hope appeared in the form of a young and very talented tinker fairy named Mary. Yes, the very same person you know as Fairy Mary. Then she was not yet the overseer, just one of the many workers in her talent guild. We had become great friends during my training. I discovered that she wasn't just talented, but a fine leader and an excellent manager. People gravitated to her willingly and felt at ease in her company. When the Tinker Guild Overseer decided it was time retire, she submitted her name for consideration and I endorsed her selection most enthusiastically.

"She was my best friend, my support system, my confidant and a willing partner in crime. Like me, she believed that one _should_ marry for love. Mary, sneaky thing that she is, was able to arrange secret liaisons between Milori and me. She never chose the same location twice and thoroughly vetted every person she enlisted in our little mischief. I must confess it was quite thrilling sneaking about under the queen's nose.

"Meeting out in the open, though, was a dangerous proposition. Mab was stern queen who did not tolerate disobedience well. She had my every movement watched and her willing spies reported immediately any deviation from my schedule. We were soon discovered and the people closest to me suffered harshly. Milori was banished to remain in the Winter Woods forever while Mary, who was the front runner to become the new Tinker Guild Overseer, was removed from consideration and permanently barred from seeking that office ever again.

"Oh dear," Rosetta gasped.

"What did you do?" Tinker Bell asked.

"That was why the tunnels were built," Clarion replied. "Mary used existing gopher tunnels which were no longer in use to form the passage from the Pixie Dust Tree. The winter fairies, who took it as an affront that their Lord of Winter was confined for all time to one season, willingly helped dig the tunnel from the library to our meeting place in the cavern.

"It was the perfect subterfuge. I would give the appearance of retiring to my study and Milori, who was also being carefully watched, would appear as if he were spending long periods of time in the library learning our histories from The Keeper of All Fairy Knowledge. Oh what wonderful moments we shared in that cavern. The sumptuous meals, the tender way he held me while we danced. And his voice was so luxurious when reading love poetry. He could make an operations manual sound romantic."

The fairies giggled in spite of themselves when they heard this. "Well it all sounds perfect," Rosetta commented. "What went wrong?"

"Wait a minute," Tinker Bell interrupted. "You said Lord Milori was banished to the Winter Woods. Wasn't he always confined to his season?"

"Oh dear, didn't you know?" Clarion responded, aghast.

"Know what?" the little green fairy asked.

"Oh, well, I thought you did. You see, dear, Pixie Hollow used to be four seasons united. This kingdom was once whole."

"Huh? I don't get it?" Zarina asked.

"I think she means winter and warm fairies didn't have to stay on their side of the border," Silvermist guessed.

"Yes, that's right. All fairies could travel to the four seasons without fear of injury. It was just as common to see winter talents in the summer gardens as it was to see warm fairies in the Frost Forest."

The girls gasped when they heard this news. "That's amazing," one said. "Incredible," said another.

"What changed all of that?" Periwinkle wanted to know, echoing the unspoken sentiment of her friends. "Why was our world divided?"

"We were betrayed."


	14. Chapter 14

**14.**

* * *

"Betrayed?!" It was a startling admission.

Actually, it was the second startling admission. The first was that warm and winter fairies weren't always separated by temperatures. Some catastrophe must have happened to isolate one fourth of the fairy population and leave them stranded forever in an icy land with very little color.

The person who was most affected by this startling revelation was Zarina. Before Clarion could resume her story Zarina wandered to the other side of the room and gazed out of the large window. In the distance were the white mountains of the Winter Woods. The young woman looked pained and distressed.

"Why so melancholy?" the queen asked her.

Zarina, wiping her eyes, trembled a bit as she spoke. "I thought… I was so certain that this was the first time in our history that winter fairies could visit the warm seasons without… without..."

"Without relying on the snowmaking machine?" Clarion guessed. "Allowing them to go wherever the please whenever they please?"

"Yes. That's right. But I guess what I did wasn't so important after all."

"Oh no, dear. Quite the contrary," Clarion told the disheartened fairy. "You have set right something made wrong. Your revolutionary pixie dust has completely unlocked all four seasons for the first time in centuries. It has reunited our world in a way no one ever thought possible."

Tinker Bell stood next to the alchemist and stared out the window at the amazing view. She said nothing for a moment before putting a hand on the alchemist's shoulder and told her, "Zarina, what you did was something truly wonderful. With your dust I can take my sister to the mainland in the middle of summer. Together we can play games with Lizzy at her cottage and enjoy picnics under the fairy camp tree while Dr. Griffiths reads stories to us. Maybe we'll even sit outside under the night sky and count the shooting stars as they streak across the heavens, just to say we did."

Periwinkle jumped to her feet in excited anticipation. "Yeah. I can't wait. It'll be so much fun. And there will be butterflies, too. So many butterflies."

"You see? All of that will be because of you and your amazing talent. You've given us something we are both truly grateful for. Something I couldn't even give my own sister. You have every reason to be proud."

Zarina threw her arms around Tinker Bell in a warm embrace. "Thank you," she whispered. "You don't know what that means to me."

"Ooh ooh ooh. I want to hear more," Gliss said excitedly to Queen Clarion.

"Yeah," Rosetta agreed. "Who betrayed you? Tell us the rest of this story."

Clarion chuckled ever so slightly. "Very well. Be seated and I will continue." The queen refreshed everyone's cup of tea and handed out more treats as she continued with her history lesson.

 **~O~**

As it turned out, there was another person who had an interest in Lord Milori's affections. Her name was Mariposa, the Minister of Summer during the reign of Queen Mab. Mariposa, whose name meant "butterfly," was an excellent minister. She was intelligent, possessed a keen eye for detail and was very creative. Mariposa was also most cunning and put that to use playing games of politics. She spent her life currying and maintaining favor with the queen.

Mab, you see, treasured mindless obedience and slavish adherence to protocol above all else. Whenever a fairy or overseer made a request Mab would extort "compromises" to mold the behavior of her subjects in exchange for approving the request. Mariposa, however, was immune to these manipulations thanks to her astute political mind.

Fairies of the realm soon realized they could ask Mariposa to bring their proposals to the crown in order to avoid Queen Mab's often draconian requirements. Mariposa, however, quickly learned to use her favored status as currency and willingly offered her good standing with the queen in exchange for "promises" she would collect on later. Despite being placed in virtually the same situation, fairies often agreed to her demands as Mariposa's favors were usually less distasteful than Queen Mab's oppressive extortions. This had the effect of making Mariposa the most popular fairy in Pixie Hollow and the most hated fairy, too.

 **~O~**

"Oh my, how could Queen Mab be so mean?" Silvermist queried.

The queen took a sip of her tea before answering. "Mab thought she was doing a service to the community. In her mind she was helping fairies to reach the very pinnacle of their talents by eliminating, as she called it, 'extraneous and unnecessary behavior.' She would never have been able to tolerate someone like Tinker Bell, Zarina or Vidia."

"Wow, I feel so lucky all of a sudden," Tinker Bell said.

"Yeah me, too," Vidia added.

"It's nice to know you recognize and appreciate that our penchant for rule breaking is a significant part of our creative processes," Zarina told the queen. "We are very grateful."

"Thank you, dear. But truth be told, I can appreciate it because in my youth I was very much like you."

"You?"

"The queen?"

"A rule breaker?"

"Oh yes. I was quite the rebel in those days," Clarion ashamedly admitted. "Mab chose to be aloof and distant from her subjects. I wanted to be a princess of the people. On any given day you could find me in the trenches with a talent guild working as hard as they did. The reasoning was that knowing how they lived and how our laws affected them and their work would make me a wiser queen. Mab thought such ideas were nonsense, but I insisted."

"So you got… dirty?" Tinker Bell asked.

"Very. The first time I met Lord Milori, a levy was failing after a particularly heavy rainfall. Tinkers were scurrying to reinforce it and I was right in the thick of things. Then, as if on que, the ground gave out from under my feet and I fell flat on my face with a splat. When Milori arrived to greet me for the very first time I was covered in mud from head to toe. I looked an absolute fright." Clarion began to laugh as she remembered that moment. "Oh the expression on his face was priceless. It was the look of the doomed. Oh, dear, what a day that was."

"Wow! I can't believe you did that!" Fawn said, shocked.

"Oh, but it didn't end there. You see, I didn't just work alongside the fairies of the realm, I played alongside them, too. In fact, I remember this one year when the Tinker Guild held an end of summer dance, with a contest as its centerpiece attraction. Naturally I joined in the merriment and even participated in the tournament. As it so happened, Mary and I were the final two contestants standing.

"You should have seen us. Mary was stiff as a board while her legs were churning away underneath her while I chose a more demonstrative form of dance, with my legs swinging and kicking and my dress flaring out in all directions. We went at it through eight long songs, each with a faster tempo than the last until finally Mary emerged the winner. It was so very tiring, but so much fun. And as I recall, that night was also the moment which forged my lifelong friendship with Mary. Has it really been so long?"

The girls looked at each other with such disbelief. Their queen dancing with Fairy Mary in a contest. Mary was well known as an expert and highly coordinated dancer, but Queen Clarion?

"It's like you were an entirely different person back then," Vidia commented.

Clarion smiled. "I was. And I still am, but the demands of my office do not allow me to be so cavalier. I must be upright, proper and in control at all times. Knowing my fate, I chose to make the most of my early years and those fond memories have seen me through more than I care to remember."

The queen then took another sip of her tea and resumed her story.


	15. Chapter 15

**15.**

* * *

"So what happened next?" Tinker Bell asked eagerly.

"I hadn't known it at the time, but Lord Milori and I were involved in a rather strange love triangle," Clarion said, picking up the story.

 **~O~**

Mariposa was most smitten by the handsome Lord of Winter, and made regular advances to win his affections. Her initial attempts were subdued and nuanced. However, when she failed to catch Milori's eye she became bold and even quite brazen, sometimes going beyond what was considered acceptable for someone of her status and position.

As it turned out she had indeed gotten his attention, but Milori had no romantic inclinations towards her at all. Unable to accept his rejection, Mariposa set out to force the issue. The Minister of Summer had carefully planned out her life and in every revision Lord Milori was always a part of it. She had convinced herself that the two were meant for each other even if he did not know it yet. This rebuke was a slap in the face.

The final humiliation came when she learned that the young princess had captured his eye and his heart. All affection Mariposa had for the Lord of Winter evaporated and in its place was jealousy and a terrible obsession to claim the Lord of Winter as her own at any cost.

The Minister of Summer became a willing ally for Queen Mab who unwaveringly disapproved of the courtship between Princess Clarion and Lord Milori. The queen attempted to monitor Princess Clarion's movements. Mariposa assisted her by calling in her many "favors" owed to her. She compelled these fairies to report back anything suspicious. Despite Mab posting a permanent detail of Scout Talents around the princess at all times, somehow Clarion was able to sneak out of the Pixie Dust Tree to continue the now secret courtship.

Mariposa, however, was certain she would learn what was going on under everyone's noses. What she did not know was that many of the fairies forced to do her dirty work loved the princess too much to destroy her happiness and reported back nothing or misdirected the ministers efforts away from the young royal lovers. Even the Scouts assigned to protect (more accurately, handle) the young princess were more than willing to look the other way whenever she tried to sneak out and meet her handsome suitor.

Eventually, however, the two young lovers were discovered. Milori was banished to his own season permanently while Clarion was forcibly engaged to marry another by order of the queen. Mariposa was certain she had her path to Milori's heart paved in pixie dust. She offered to speak to the queen and lift his banishment, however, even with such a promise on the table Milori refused to marry the Minister of Summer. She was infuriated, but not so much that she failed to notice how both he and the princess still seemed to have a sparkle in their eyes and a spring in their step.

She deduced that they were still meeting in private.

She shared her suspicions with the queen and when it was discovered that princess and lord were spending so much time in "study" they both knew what was going on. That is when Mariposa played her ace in the hole, as it were. If her conclusion was correct, then even in marriage Clarion would continue a courtly romance with Lord Milori. Such a relationship would be chaste, but also very illicit. Unwilling to tolerate such disobedience, Mab willingly entertained Mariposa's proposal: that Milori be made to wed Mariposa. She would in turn keep him far too busy and under her constant and watchful eye to further pursue any kind of romance with the princess and thereby ending Clarion's rampant disregard for royal authority.

Mab enthusiastically approved the idea. Everything was coming together perfectly. There was only one loose thread remaining, learning how and where these secret meetings were being held. Mariposa spent days combing through the library to learn just how Milori was able to disappear into the building for hours and then suddenly reappear. She was thwarted each time until by sheer chance once night she spotted the faintest glow coming from a cave in a mountain that lay along the border.

 **~O~**

"That was when our secret meeting place was discovered," Clarion announced to the fairies who were gathered around her. "Mab, to prevent us from using that cave, again posted guards at every exit. Our illicit romance had come to an end, and we were condemned to two arranged marriages neither of us wanted."

"Oh my!" Rosetta gasped, nearly succumbing to a case of the vapors.

"What happened? How did you get and Lord Milori get out of your arranged marriages?" Tinker Bell asked.

"Yeah, don't stop now."

"We're dying to know."

"Please, please, please!"

Clarion chuckled. "It was nothing any of us did, I can assure you. You see, nature intervened."

"Huh? What does that mean?" Vidia asked.

 **~O~**

The date on which the two weddings were to be performed was approaching. Princess Clarion was confined to her quarters until then. She was surrounded from early morning until the late evening hours by tutors and guards. Clarion, though a princess, was treated as a prisoner in her own realm.

One night a knock at the door changed everything.

A summoner talent entered the room, rousing the princess from her unpleasant sleep. He, along with two royal guardsmen, stood before her. "What is it, Summoner," she asked him.

"I bring unhappy news. Queen Mab is dead, having passed this night." He, along with everyone else in the room suddenly bowed in Clarion's presence and announced, "Long live Queen Clarion the First. Ruler of all Pixie Hollow, Regent of Never Land Island and Defender of the Fairy Faith. Long live the queen."


	16. Chapter 16

**16.**

* * *

"Queen Mab's light went out?" Tink clarified.

"So you became queen?" Silvermist asked. "Wow, I did not see that coming."

Upon hearing this Vidia and Spike both face palmed, Fawn rolled her eyes and Tinker Bell did a double take.

"I'm just glad Mab was gone!" Gliss babbled. "Oops. I meant 'how sad.'"

Everyone thought Queen Clarion was going to dress down the young frost fairy, but that didn't happen. "I shared the same conflicting feelings, Gliss," she admitted. "On the one hand with her gone I would no longer be subjected to her rules or her tutoring and I could put an end to both sham marriages before they were ever formalized. On the other, Pixie Hollow had lost its longest reigning monarch and a great queen. And I was now forced to step up as ruler, all without any guidance to assist me."

"Were you scared?" Periwinkle asked of her.

"Oh yes. Very much. My training was not yet complete. I approached my new role with a great deal of trepidation."

"But you were now queen, couldn't you do whatever you wanted?" Tinker Bell asked.

"Technically, yes. However just having authority does not make you a good ruler. Wisdom, restraint and foresight are all important factors along with a great deal of understanding, compassion and a strong knowledge of the law. I was still sorely lacking in some of those areas."

"What about the Minister of Summer?" Rosetta asked her queen. "What did she do now that her scheme was brought to an abrupt end? Did you punish her for what she did?"

Clarion took a sip of her tea and smiled. "I offered her my forgiveness," Clarion responded. "In spite of everything I didn't want my reign as queen to begin with a bitter fairy within my ranks. Mariposa accepted and from that moment on neither of us spoke of it ever again."

The girls just stared at Queen Clarion. "Wait. So that's it? Nothing else happened?"

"You didn't let me finish," Clarion replied. "It was never spoken of again until she betrayed us."

 **~O~**

* * *

The coronation was a great affair, filled with festivities that rivaled any held before in Pixie Hollow. The installation of a new queen was such a rare event that those who witnessed it considered themselves beyond fortunate. While the general populace reveled outside the Pixie Dust Tree, inside things were very different. Queen Clarion called each of her ministers one by one into her new private office to explain just what it was she expected of them.

The ministers were not entirely shocked when they learned that their new queen would be quite a bit more informal than their previous. Mab was devoted to protocol, Clarion simply wanted an orderly discussion of any agenda put before them. What she wanted from them was pretty much what any queen wanted from their closest advisors: their knowledge, industry and informed opinion within their field of expertise. But when it came to speak with the Minister of Summer, Mariposa was more than nervous. She was certain that today would be her last day in the realm of the Never Fairies.

"Minister, it has come to my attention that you were quite complicit in Queen Mab's machinations for my arranged marriage," Clarion began. "And that you yourself suggested the arranged marriage between yourself and Lord Milori knowing full well he was in love with someone else. I suppose it did not occur to you that once I became queen I would learn of these efforts."

Mariposa remained silent, preferring to wait for the axe to fall.

"Queen Mab was quite thorough in her diary which made for some very interesting reading," Clarion added, reminding the minister that as queen she was privy to such exclusive materials.

"What is to become of me?" Mariposa finally asked, her tone suggested she knew her fate already.

The queen stood immediately before the Minister of Summer and looked her over. Then she spoke. "What I want is your loyalty," Clarion told her. "I want you to perform your duties as Minister of Summer and to advise me without bias when the need arises."

Clarion never spoke the word directly, but it was clear that she was willing to forgive Mariposa if she was willing to be a loyal subject and to put her feelings for Milori aside. The Minister of Summer recognized this olive branch and accepted. "Your Majesty is most gracious. I will be your most loyal advisor."

"Thank you. I look forward to our many future collaborations."

 **~O~**

Over the next several seasons Mariposa kept her word. She was indeed Queen Clarion's most loyal and devoted advisor bringing to the mainland some of the most colorful summer seasons the humans had ever enjoyed. Clarion was impressed with her work and even went so far as to publicly recognize her work.

What no one knew was that underneath the placid and dedicated exterior Mariposa seethed with bitterness, anger and hatred for the new queen. Clarion and Milori carried on their courtly relationship out in the open, maintaining at all times their necessary propriety. However Mariposa convinced herself that the two did this specifically to mock and vex her. The reality was the polar opposite, but the Minister of Summer refused to even entertain such an idea. In her mind, they were laughing at her.

She felt betrayed by Clarion and wished for nothing more than to find a way to separate the two forever. Unfortunately she was powerless to do anything of the sort and Mariposa's preoccupation with the two only grew more and more fevered. One summer while bringing in her season Mariposa happened to overhear a conversation between two humans who were discussing a powerful evil wizard that lived on a faraway mountaintop. This wizard supposedly had immense magic and could do all manner of unholy deeds including raising the dead to serve him or calling upon the most sinister demons to do his bidding.

It was a cautionary tale from a traveler meant to scare away any one who thought of venturing that way. Mariposa was intrigued but remembered that humans were a superstitious lot who believed almost anything told to them so long as it was attached to the supernatural in some fashion. They did, after all, consider fairies to be creatures which served the Devil who were supposed to kidnap infants from their cribs, replacing them with fairies who took on the identical form. Changelings was the term adopted by the silly humans.

In spite of every reason not to believe what she had heard, Mariposa was intrigued by the possibility that this wizard had the power to give her what she wanted, the man she coveted most. The following summer season Mariposa went in search of this user of magic. It took nearly half a decade but she finally tracked down her quarry and returned one year with the means to exact her revenge.

One evening late that summer Mariposa made her move. Warm fairies were hard at work preparing to bring autumn to the mainland while the Winter Fairies were being diligent in their task to be ready for their season some four months later. The Minister of Summer stole away that evening under the cover of darkness and came to the divide between the Spring and Winter seasons. Here she took a gem which this wizard had provided. She cut the palm of her hand and lathered the red gemstone with her own blood before shoving it forcibly into the ground.

 **~O~**

* * *

"I was in the Pixie Dust Tree reading reports and preparing an itinerary for the next day when I heard it," Clarion told her audience. "It sounded like the loudest clap of thunder. A second later the ground shook violently. When I happened to look outside there was a column of flame which lit up the entirety of Pixie Hollow as it were midday. I thought the sky itself was on fire."

 **~O~**

* * *

The pillar of fire caught the attention of every fairy and sparrow man in Pixie Hollow. Suddenly that pillar spread outward like a giant wall with the warm season on one side and the winter season on the other. Clarion and her three ministers flew out to learn what was happening, but while in midflight they heard, and then felt, another explosion. The shockwave knocked them out of the air.

The ground shook and shuddered under their feet. The closer they came to the flames the worse it got. Along the way branches fell, trees collapsed, boulders were wrenched out of their resting places and bounded across the quaking ground. The queen and her advisors did their best to stay airborne, but the powerful shockwaves meant that they could not fly for more than a few seconds at a time before being forced out of the air.

When Clarion arrived on the scene she found a petrified Mariposa already there. From the flames Queen Clarion could hear the voices of a billion doomed souls all screaming in agony at once. It was deafening and terrifying, as if Hell itself had been unleashed upon Pixie Hollow.

Suddenly the earth lurched and shuddered so violently that all of Never Land shook. The ground rent itself in two and any fairy unlucky to be thrown into the flames was incinerated instantly. When the horror ended the ground between the warm and winter seasons had separated. The gap was filled with water running off from the snow covered mountains. Curiously, one side flowed while the other was frozen solid.

A number of winter fairies came across to the warm side to render aide. Immediately they felt the intense heat upon them. It sapped them of their strength and withered their wings. Nothing like this had ever happened before. They were aided across the water by several nature fairies who instantly reported the unbearable cold. Their wings began to freeze. They had to come back to the Spring season and when they did they recovered quickly.

Mariposa, unwilling to believe what she had been told, flew into the Winter season to greet Lord Milori who was on the other side trying to make sense of what he had just experienced. She tried to ignore the freezing temperatures against her skin but after several minutes she had to be helped back across. Her wings were frozen completely solid and her hair was covered in frost.

"What have I done?" she said. "By the Second Star what have I done?" Immediately her countenance changed from horror to anger. "I've been tricked. He tricked me!"

"What did you do, Minister?" Clarion asked Mariposa. "Who tricked you? Why did you do this?"

Mariposa, suddenly realizing what she had wrought, dropped to her knees and confessed everything to her queen. When she finished the woman sputtered that she had been tricked by this wizard. "I asked him for something to keep you and Lord Milori apart. But what I got…"

"What you got is exactly what you asked for, Minister," Clarion said angrily. "Only now we are all made to suffer so you could satisfy your taste for vengeance." Then the queen added, "Mariposa what you feel for Lord Milori is not love. You want to control him, to make him love you against his will. That can never happen. You have become obsessed with making him not your lover but your slave."

"No. No, I'm sorry. I just wanted him to love me, but… but… He doesn't love me and he never will. He loves you." Mariposa stood, wiping the tears from her face. "I am very sorry. My hatred blinded me. I will make this right. I promise you, my queen, I will make this right and Pixie Hollow will be restored."

 **~O~**

* * *

"The Minister of Summer left Pixie Hollow determined to undo what she had done," Clarion told the girls. "Unfortunately, she never returned."

"Hmph! Coward!" Vidia sniffed.

"How would you know?" Tinker Bell scoffed. "For all we know this wizard refused to help her."

"Do you know where this wizard lives?" Periwinkle asked. "Maybe we can get him to reverse the magic."

"Unfortunately Mariposa never revealed his exact location," Clarion told them.

"Then we'll find him," Tinker Bell announced. "Right, girls?"

"No, Tinker Bell. Not this time," Clarion told the young tinker fairy. "You see I sent out a number of expeditions to locate this place. We lost so many good fairies and sparrow men that Milori and I agreed never again to do so."

"Well, how many of these expeditions never came back?" Gliss asked.

"All of them," Clarion told them, a touch of bitter remorse in her voice. "This is why those who were present took an oath never to reveal this information to anyone. We didn't want anyone else to take it upon themselves to look for this person and I will not ask you or any else to risk their lives over this matter"

"You don't have to ask," Tinker Bell chirped. "We'll volunteer. Right, girls?"

"I'm sorry, Tinker Bell. But it would be a death sentence."

"Tink," Vidia whispered, "this is one time when you can't solve your way out it. Just let it go."

"I can't. The happiness of Queen Clarion and Lord Milori is on the line."

"Our happiness is in good hands," Clarion responded. "It has survived this long, including centuries of self-imposed exile. The coat you have designed will be more than sufficient for us."

Tinker Bell was very excited to take on another great adventure. To solve another unsolvable problem. "Your Highness. We can do this. We have never let you down before."

"Tinker Bell! You are all expressly forbidden by order of your queen! Do I make myself clear?!"

This took everyone by surprise. Up until now Queen Clarion's tone of voice had been gentle and even jovial at times. But now that all had changed. In one moment she went from speaking like a close friend, to speaking like an angry parent scolding a misbehaving child.

Tinker Bell gulped hard. "Yes, Your Majesty. Very clear."

"Good. None of you are to repeat or speak of what you heard today. Not even with each other," Clarion added. "And if any one of you are found to be making an attempt to venture out to search for this wizard without authorization you will be arrested and charged with treason."

The girls all gasped, and with good reason. Treason was the only charge in Pixie Hollow that carried with it a penalty of death.


	17. Chapter 17

**17.**

* * *

Queen Clarion took a nervous sip of her tea. The royal's outburst and admonishment of Tinker Bell drained the reverie out of the room. Suddenly everyone felt very uncomfortable. None of the fairies wanted to stay, though no one could give a good enough reason to excuse themselves. Fortunately, Clarion recognized that she had broken the spirit of storytelling. "I think that will be enough for tonight. Remember that none of you are to speak of this too anyone."

Clarion then dismissed all of her subjects. Except for one.

"Tinker Bell," Clarion called to her most inventive and accomplished tinker fairy. "I know how much you want to solve this problem. It is in your very nature. Your extreme curiosity and talent often serves you well. You have helped Pixie Hollow in ways none of us could have possibly imagined."

"Thank you, Your Highness."

"Unfortunately, these traits can also be very troublesome. Under no circumstances are you to embark on any attempt to undo what has been done."

"But how do you know it can't be undone?"

"Because it cannot. On this, you must trust me."

Tink immediately became aware that Clarion was holding something back. She knew more than she was letting on. There was another secret buried in her words. A secret so bleak that the queen would not reveal it, even to her. To any other fairy this would have been reason enough to let the subject die. For Tinker Bell it the VERY reason she had to learn what that secret was and fix it.

"And Tinker Bell, I was being very serious," Clarion added. "The punishment for disobeying this order _is_ death…by beheading. Please don't make me have to enforce it ag-," Clarion stopped herself.

 _Again? Was that what she was about to say? Clarion has given the order to end the life of another fairy?_ It was a disturbing thought. Or was this just Clarion's way of spooking Tinker Bell into obeying her edict? Tink had no reason to doubt the queen's resolve. It did spotlight that there was more than one dark secret surrounding this mystery of Pixie Hollow's past. The question then was Tinker Bell willing to risk her own life to learn what those secrets were? And would doing nothing eat her up inside?

 **~O~**

"I can't believe I would ever live to see the day," Iridessa commented.

"She's been like this for days," Periwinkle said. "Ever since our little talk with Queen Clarion my sister has been moping around and now she won't even move."

Tink's many friends had gathered in Periwinkle's home at her request. Tinker Bell was slumped over Peri's sofa, her head laying over the armrest, her eyes facing the wall but in truth were staring into a void. "She won't move. She won't eat. I can barely get her to talk to me," the frost fairy informed the others. "It's like she's just decided to give up."

"What's wrong with her?" Fawn asked.

"Tink has been presented with a problem she is not allowed to solve," Zarina told them. "There is nothing worse for a tinker fairy." Zarina also noticed how Tinker Bell was laying on the sofa, as if waiting for the axe to fall. But figuratively and literally.

"Hey! Stop this!" Vidia shouted trying to rouse the girl. "You're not going to spend the rest of your life moping about. Now get back to work doing your tinker fairy thing."

Tink just lay there, motionless and saying nothing. Vidia, who did not suffer fools well, grabbed the girl by the shoulders and pulled her up hoping to get some kind of response from her. Nothing. Tink hung motionless in Vidia's grasp. "Ugh! Fine. Be that way."

Vidia dropped the blonde back onto the sofa and walked away.

"Where do you think you're going?" Rosetta asked her. "You are her friend?"

"Yeah, I'm her friend but right now she doesn't want to be mine," Vidia sniffed. Then she looked at Tinker Bell and scolded her at the top of her voice. "You got us into this! You and your insatiable curiosity. None of what we now know is going away so learn to live with it."

With that Vidia took flight and never looked back. The others just glanced at each other. Zarina was right. Tinker Bell was feeling sick because before her was the greatest problem she had ever been presented with, a riddle so grand it absolutely begged to be solved, yet by the queen's orders she was not allowed to try and solve it under penalty of death.

Silvermist sat down beside the girl and put a friendly hand on her shoulder. "Oh, Tink. We miss you. It's not the same without everyone together. I know, why don't we all get together and play a game of leap frog."

Fawn perked up. "Yeah, Tink. You and Terence can be a team. Wouldn't that be great?"

Tinker Bell picked up her head. It seemed as if the invitation had done the trick. But the look she gave her friends dashed all hopes. Her eyes appeared sunken and red. She had clearly been crying. Tink's blonde hair was slipping out of its chignon and strands were stuck to her cherubic face.

"Oh come on, Tinker Bell. Enough is enough!" Spike lambasted.

"Hey, how about a riddle?" Gliss suggested. Everyone turned and glared at the frost fairy. Unfortunately, she didn't realize the inherent irony of her words and, clueless, pressed forward. "It's a good one. Okay, here goes. What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon and three in the evening?"

Fawn, who was the group's resident animal fairy, was struck by this strange description. "There is no such animal."

"Gliss don't make up such stupid jokes," Spike said, scolding her friend. "No such thing exists anywhere."

"It's a human," Tink mumbled.

"Human?" Silvermist asked.

"They crawl on all fours as babies, walk on two legs as teenagers and adults, and then use a cane to assist their walking in their old age. Babies are the morning, teenager and adult are the afternoon and old age is evening."

Everyone stared at Gliss once again, this time astonished that her silly riddle actually got Tinker Bell to respond.

"Wow! Just when I think she's totally gone nuts she throws me a curveball," Spike said, commenting on Gliss and her strange words.

"Tinker Bell. Finally," Rosetta sighed. "Now let's go home."

"I can't," Tink painfully admitted. She sat up to address her friends. "I want to work on my projects, but all I can think about is the story the queen told us. Minister of Summer Mariposa kept Queen Clarion and Lord Milori apart for so very long. And it robbed Periwinkle and me of several years together. Every part of my being wants to find out who gave Mariposa that magic curse and how it can be reversed. If only the queen would let us."

"It is still so hard to believe that anyone would betray Queen Clarion," Iridessa said. "I thought all fairies were supposed to be good people."

"Oh we are, but that doesn't mean we can't make mistakes," Fawn replied. "Mariposa just gave into her own selfishness. Reminds me of a certain fast flyer we all know."

"So if everyone knew that it was dangerous to cross over how did Lord Milori break his wing?" Silvermist asked no one in particular.

"It's not like he knew his wings would break," Tinker Bell replied. "It was all brand new territory back then." Tink stood, then walked to the giant open window of Periwinkle's apartment which overlooked the Winter Woods and all of Pixie Hollow. She leaned against the wall and sighed. It was a dreadful sigh, full of anger and frustration and defeat. "This is all eating me up inside. I'm not just doing it for Queen Clarion and Lord Milori or for myself and Periwinkle. I want to do this for everyone. Think of all the friends and lovers who could never see each other again when the border was closed. How many guild mates do you think were separated? How many great ideas never got off the ground because they were denied access to the input of someone on the other side?"

"Tink, we've overcome all of that," Zarina told her. "Your snowmaker, my special dust. It's overcome all of those obstacles."

"Not all of the obstacles," Tink observed. "See?" Tinker Bell pointed to her dress and to everyone else's garments who were visiting from the warm seasons. Everyone not native to the Winter Woods had the color blue splashed through their normal guild colors as a reminder that they still needed assistance to visit the cold season of Pixie Hollow. "Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could just fly across without needed to frost our wings or sprinkle ourselves with dust every time? I mean no disrespect, Zarina, what you've done is amazing, but we shouldn't stop there. I want to finish the job, so why won't Queen Clarion allow it?"

"It's too dangerous," Rosetta replied, providing the voice of sanity.

"We've faced danger before," Tink reminded her.

"But no one's threatened to execute us for tryin'," Rosetta added. "I think Vidia may be right, Shoog. You're just going to have to learn to live with this one. Don't let your curiosity eat you up inside. You'll turn into Mariposa and none of us wants that."

Tink crinkled up one side of her face, offering half of a weak smile to her redheaded friend. "I'll try, but I don't know if I can."

"I'll help her," Periwinkle volunteered.

"And so will we," Silvermist added.

"Then I guess with everyone's help I can get through this after all."

"Good for you, Tink," Rosetta smiled. "We'll be waiting for you on the warm side whenever you're ready to come back. And don't worry, Sugarplum, you won't be alone. Each of us is in that same boat but we can get through it together."

One by one the girls hugged Tinker Bell in an act of solidarity and then each took flight, returning to their side of the border switching their talents back when they crossed. Tinker Bell and Periwinkle watched them each flutter away. Once the last was far enough the sisters looked at each other and smiled.

"You think they bought it?" Tink asked.

"Every word," Peri giggled.

"Great. Let's go, we have to finish before we're discovered."

Tinker Bell and her sister Periwinkle hurried out of the frost fairy's apartment and nonchalantly made their way across the white landscape where a Snowy Owl waited for them. Mounting the bird, the animal took flight, gliding between the leafless trees until it settle into a gentle flight across a frozen tundra. The two fairies avoided areas of the Winter Woods heavily populated by the inhabitants to avoid detection. Their reasons for such subterfuge was simple: despite the stern warnings of their queen, the sisters were going anyway.

 **~O~**

The nature of their ruse had been both simple, yet elegant. First, it convinced the other girls that Tinker Bell would not be engaging in this outrageous pursuit. Second, that information would filter its way to the monarchy who would be convinced that Tinker Bell, though going through withdrawals, was following the queen's edict. And lastly, it would explain Tinker Bell's prolonged absence to anyone who might get curious.

"What if your friends come back to my apartment?" Periwinkle asked. The owl landed at the mouth of a cave high atop a mountain deep within the northern landscapes of the Winter Woods. The duo were far away from prying eyes where they could work in peace completing a durable, long range balloon carrier that the two planned to pilot in search of the answer to Queen Clarion's odd riddle.

"We'll be long gone by then," Tinker Bell replied, striding alongside her sister as they entered the cave. "When we return it will be with the means to reunify Pixie Hollow. Queen Clarion will have no choice but to forgive us for disobeying her orders."

"So that's what you two are planning?"

Tinker Bell and Periwinkle nearly leapt out of their wings in surprise. The voice was a familiar one.

"Vidia? How did you know?"

"Because I was a tinker once, remember?" the purple clad fast flyer told her friend. "I know how you think."

"Wait? You were just shining me on?" Tinker Bell suddenly realized. "That whole time it was just an act?"

"Yup. And I'm here to stop you from your crazy idea, Tink. You are going to get yourself killed and your sister along with you."

"We'll be fine on our own, thank you very much," Tink replied, indignant.

"Well, I for one think what you did to us was lousy," Rosetta admonished as she and the other others appeared in the cave doorway. "Vidia tracked us down and clued us in. I can't believe we felt sorry for you."

"I can't leave this alone," Tinker Bell protested. "And neither can Periwinkle."

Vidia stared at the frost fairy. "Is that true, Peri?"

"Yes it is."

"Or is Tinker Bell railroading you into doing this?" Vidia asked as a follow up.

"No. I want to do this as much as my sister," Peri announced. "I want to be able to visit Tinker Bell without having to change my talent or with a snow machine following me around."

"I can understand," Rosetta breathed.

"Ro?"

"What?"

"You?"

"Well I have someone I love on the other side, too, you know," the redheaded garden fairy protested. "It would be nice to visit without frosting my wings or putting on all those jackets, even if I do look smashing in them."

Vidia just face palmed at how easily Rosetta was able to complain about something and yet compliment her looks in the same sentence.

Rosetta did not take too kindly to Vidia's demonstration. "Well excuse me for having some fashion sense!"

"It's the only sense you have," Vidia spat, "seeing as how you lack common sense."

"Girls! Girls! Girls!" Iridessa shouted, trying to stop the infighting. "Let's not forget why we are here."

Zarina stood forward and eyed Tinker Bell's balloon carrier. It was larger than her last design. It had two bunks, extra storage space for food and water and some small barrels which the dust talent assumed were for yellow pixie dust that Tink and Peri intended to steal from the tree which grew within Skull Island. "It's not enough," she said. "You'll need to carry more dust than this."

Vidia couldn't believe her ears. "What? You can't possibly agree with what they are doing?"

Zarina turned around to face her compatriots. "I do. I made the dust so our people could cross over more easily. But that was before I knew how our world was divided. My goal is still the same, so I am joining Tinker Bell and Periwinkle on their quest."

As Vidia shook her head in disbelief Rosetta stepped forward and joined the other three, announcing she was doing it for Sled. Fawn, who could only think of her animals and all the years she could not follow them in the Winter Woods took her place alongside the foursome.

In quick succession Iridessa, Silvermist, Gliss and Spike all decided to be a part of this dangerous plan. Even if it meant the end of their lives. Vidia was the last one standing alone. She was used to being the contrarian, it was pretty much in her nature. Yet these were her friends and to let them go without her seemed wrong. "Ugh! I guess I'm coming along, too," she announced. "Someone's got to make sure you get back alive."

Tinker Bell and Periwinkle welcomed their friends into their adventure.

Peri, seeing at how much their group had grown declared. "We're going to need a bigger boat."

"I was about to say the same thing."

The girls all whirled around and stared in horror. Standing in the mouth of the cave were the elite scouts led by Nyx. With them were Queen Clarion and Lord Milori.

Vidia gulped hard as she massaged her throat. "Why didn't I just stay in bed this morning?"


	18. Chapter 18

**18.**

* * *

Not one fairy moved a muscle. Each one knew they had just admitted to an unforgivable act of treason. More than just a crime, but a betrayal. A betrayal against the crown itself. The only law, which when broken, carried a penalty of death. They had all sworn solidarity with Tinker Bell and now they had each signed their own death warrants.

Several pairs of eyes followed Queen Clarion as she moved about through the cavern. She reviewed the large balloon carrier with exceptional curiosity. At every turn she seemed almost pleased with the airship. The riggings were top notch, the construction was sturdy and beyond what was necessary, and the tree sap was precisely and cleanly applied. Everything that was expected from her best tinker fairy.

"You never cease to amaze me, Tinker Bell," Clarion complimented. "Your work is always superb."

Tink gulped down her paralyzing fear. "Th-thank you, Your Majesty."

"However, I do remember telling you not to pursue this course of action. Or am I mistaken?"

"N-No, Your Majesty. You're not mistaken, I mean."

"I see. So you built this in clear defiance of my orders?"

Tinker Bell was sweating hard. She knew the answer she had to give. There was no other, but it would also incriminate herself. "Y… Yes, Your Majesty. I did."

"We did," Periwinkle offered up, unwilling to let her sister take all the blame upon herself.

Lord Milori stood immediately before the siblings, eyeing each one separately. He shook his head in disgust and sighed. "I am very disappointed in you, Periwinkle. I had thought you would be more sensible."

"I'm… I am very sorry, Lord Milori," the young frost talent said, her voice trembling. "We wanted to do this for all of Pixie Hollow. The fairies deserve to live as they once did," she said, her voice loud so it could carry throughout the entire room. Then she caught herself and returned to a contrite whisper. "All we wanted is for all of fairy kind to be free of the limitations they've lived with for so long."

"Do you know what you've just admitted to?" Clarion asked sternly. "What this means for both of you and your friends?"

Both Tinker Bell and Periwinkle began to cry. They each looked at the other, realizing their lives were now forfeit. No longer would they be able to enjoy games in the Winter Woods, or buzzing Fawn's poor animals or playing hide and seek in Rosetta's gardens. Soon, there would be nothing. Or perhaps something. No one knew what happened to a baby's first laugh when a fairy died.

Tinker Bell nodded. "Yes, Queen Clarion. We do."

Clarion then looked over the other girls, all of whom had also been ready to commit this act of treason. Vidia kept rubbing her throat, as if waiting for the axe to fall. Rosetta pouted, heartbroken that she would never again see her beloved Sled. Fawn hoped her animal friends wouldn't miss her too much. Iridessa shook like a leaf, fear having completely overtaken her. Silvermist held her head low, realizing the mistake she had made. Spike, Gliss and Zarina all had gathered together and held each other in both comfort and support.

The queen looked downcast. "I am partly to blame for this," she said. "If I had not told you that story none of this would have happened."

"No, Queen Clarion, I started this," Tinker Bell admitted. "My curiosity got the best of me."

The queen sighed. "And if I had made up a suitable lie it could have prevented all of this."

"What is to become of us now?" Periwinkle asked, though she was certain of the answer.

Clarion finished looking over the nearly complete balloon carrier. She once again admired the impeccable workmanship and attention to detail that was the hallmark of Tinker Bell's efforts and creativity. She was clearly admiring the craftsmanship, but Tinker Bell got the sense that Clarion couldn't bear to look at the girls. Was she embarrassed? Disgusted? Angry? Disappointed?

Yes, she would clearly have to be disappointed. Lord Milori had said as much and his words echoed Clarion's body language.

"What shall I do with you?" Queen Clarion restated. "I shall ask you build a larger carrier. One suitable for you all of your friends."

Neither Tinker Bell nor Periwinkle could believe their ears. "I beg your pardon?"

"If you were anyone else I would not allow any of this," Clarion began. "However, Tinker Bell, you and your friends seem to have a penchant for choosing the most recklessly direct course of action and then rising to the challenge. Never before has Pixie Hollow enjoyed such a convergence of sheer talent, problem solving and friendship. I hereby authorize you to locate and negotiate for a counteragent to the curse which has divided Pixie Hollow for so long."

The girls all stared at each other in disbelief. Then they turned to Queen Clarion to make sure she was being serious. Tink was the first one to smile and then break out into joyous noises, "Thank you. Thank you, Queen Clarion. You won't be disappointed."

"Yes, Tinker Bell. I know. And may I recommend you adapt the captured human pirate ship and fill it with pixie dust from Zarina's tree in Skull Rock."

A chorus of cheers rose from the small band of fairy friends gathered in the cave. Vidia let out a breath of relief. Rosetta cried with delight as she planned to fly straight into Sled's arms tonight. Fawn couldn't wait to get back to her animal friends while Silvermist hugged anyone and everyone she could find. Even Spike was pleased with the news. She embraced Silvermist and then engaged in a jumping fest with Gliss, Zarina and Iridessa, alternately cheering and crying over their good fortune.

Tinker Bell, excited, had already begun discussing plans for improvements with Periwinkle so it could properly accommodate the fairies on their lengthy quest. Each bunk could be divided into two sets of quarters. The sails would be reinforced with fairy magic so they wouldn't tear, the galley would be filled with all the food water they could ever eat and the cargo area would have to split between the treasure and the Pixie Dust necessary to make the trip.

Clarion, though, had to put a damper on the festivities. "Please listen. You may not speak of this to anyone. Your mission is secret in nature. If you succeed then I will make known to everyone our history. If you fail, however, you must return and keep your silence."

Silvermist promptly raised her hand. "Uh, where are we going, anyway?"

"When Mariposa confessed what she had done, she revealed the exact location of the wizard who provided her with the dark magic," Clarion replied. "A tower in the mountains of France near the border with Spain."

"But do be careful," Milori continued. "Our previous attempts failed because this wizard possesses an amoral soul and enjoys watching others beg for mercy. In all likelihood he will not want to surrender the counter spell, but you should try to negotiate for it first."

Clarion informed Tinker Bell to adapt the pirate ship to carry a sufficient quantity of treasure to offer as compensation. The queen was not certain the wizard would accept. His considerable powers would likely allow him to conjure up all the treasure he could ever want, but perhaps it might help.

"If that fails you are authorized to steal the counter spell by any means necessary," Clarion said. "To that end you are to train with Nyx in the art of stealth and acquisitions. The scouts will also provide some of their sleeping powder to use against the wizard. Keep in mind this wizard is most powerful and he is quite the trickster. Imperiling others is one way he chooses to entertain himself."

"If that's the case why not just waltz in and take the spell first?" Spike suggested.

"As a creature of magic this wizard can sense your presence. Diplomacy must be your first option," Clarion warned. "If all else fails, then you may attempt to steal the counter spell."

"That is why you are being supplied with the sleeping dust," Milori told them. "Distract him, hit him with the dust and then take the counter spell before he wakes."

"Well, girls," Tinker Bell began, "it looks like we have our work cut out for us. Let's get cracking."

 **~O~**

Upon returning to the Pixie Dust Tree, Queen Clarion promptly wrote out a note on a piece of leaf paper. But instead of writing in the fairy language, she struggled trying to pen the words in French. When it was completed she folded the note into an envelope, dripped some melted wax to close it and impressed her personal seal in the wax, adding a touch of fairy magic to seal the document fully.

"Viola, quickly. Take one of the balloon carriers and all the pixie dust you'll need. Deliver this to The Sorcerer's Tower in the Pyrenees Mountains just to the east of the Principality of Andorra. This must be taken directly to The Sorcerer himself and do not leave until he has acknowledged the favor I have ask of him."

"Yes, Your Majesty." Viola, taking the note, stocked some food, water and cold weather gear in an airship and left the kingdom of Pixie Hollow barely half an hour later. Queen Clarion looked on trusting in Viola's abilities.

"Do you think he will agree to help us?" Milori asked.

"He will, I'm sure of it," Clarion replied. "Despite his stoic and hardened demeanor The Sorcerer is very generous. With his help all of this nonsense can finally come to an end. Tinker Bell will steal a worthless spell. She will return with it, the counter spell will have no effect and I will tell her that nothing can overcome the curse."

"Unless Tinker Bell uncovers our deception," Milori said, fingering the devil in the details. "She is very intelligent."

"Then we must be smarter than she is or else Tinker Bell will find the real location of the curse and Heaven help her if she does."

* * *

 **Thanks to everyone who has been adding this story to their Favorite and or Follow list. And of course, all of your feedback and reviews are appreciated.**


	19. Chapter 19

**19.**

* * *

Tinker Bell was undecided. She had been wanting to tackle the human ship as a pet project for some time now, converting it for use by the fairies of Pixie Hollow. But a vessel of this size might be too big for the task and it would be quite visible from the ground. Unless, of course, they stayed away from populated areas and flew above the clouds when that wasn't feasible.

She also calculated that docking a ship of this size next to a castle or a tower would be impractical. A smaller airship would certainly be required to meet all of those requirements. But a smaller ship wouldn't be able to carry all of that treasure Clarion promised. And there would need to be room for all the pixie dust such a journey would require.

"Oh decisions, decisions," she muttered trying to puzzle this out. Then she had a brilliant idea. Or rather, she hit upon someone else's brilliant idea. The pirate vessel carried smaller rowboats for going ashore. She reasoned that the airship she and Periwinkle had been working could function in the same way. Tinker Bell gave the order to work on both projects, splitting up her friends into two work details with Periwinkle as project lead on the balloon carrier and herself in charge of converting the pirate ship.

"This is going to be a grand adventure," she mused, more than proud of herself.

 **~O~**

While Tinker Bell and her friends carried on with a great fervor, Queen Clarion remained in a constant state of worry and panic. She had done her best to try and prevent Tink's curiosity from going this far. She had even threatened charging them with treason if they acted on the information, but it wasn't enough to stop the headstrong tinker fairy. The little tinker was determined to right this wrong no matter what.

Clarion could certainly understand. She had her own reasons for seeing this curse finally lifted. But she knew from where the curse originated and the source was not to be trifled with. It wielded a power greater than even The Sorcerer. It could raise ghosts and spirits from their rest, call upon the undead and command legions of the most foul creatures ever to roam the Earth. Anyone daring to cross its path would be made to suffer, eternally.

Queen Clarion had carefully crafted her little lie on the belief it would finally dash Tinker Bell's hopes and force her to give up. But it wasn't enough. Now it had gone much too far and Clarion was desperate to put an end to this before Tinker Bell and her friends found themselves face to face with the monster that cursed Pixie Hollow.

The queen just hoped that Tinker Bell would finally accept that this was something she could not change, no matter how much the little fairy wanted to believe otherwise.

 **~O~**

Weeks later a visibly weakened Viola returned with a second balloon carrier gliding alongside. Fearful that Viola might not have enough dust to make the return trip if she encountered any trouble Clarion dispatched a second balloon carrier heavily laden with pixie dust to anchor half way to The Sorcerer's Tower just in case the Summoner talent required additional dust.

It turned out to be a prudent move. Viola's airship was empty of its supply of dust when she encountered the refueling vessel. The journey on the way back was hampered by bad weather, predatory birds and humans living amongst the mountains who tried to shoot down the airship. The blonde summoner was forced to make numerous course corrections and burn up large amounts of dust to avoid these obstacles and still return in a timely manner.

When Viola appeared before the queen the little summoner was exhausted, bedraggled, badly dehydrated, fiercely hungry and in desperate need of a bath and new clothes. What she wore was torn and dirty owing to her long and often times dangerous trip.

"Are you well" Clarion asked.

Viola nodded. "Yes, Your Majesty. The Sorcerer has agreed to help and he sends his regards, from one magic wielder to another."

"Thank you, dear, Viola. Now why don't you get some food and rest? You deserve it."

"Yes, Your Majesty."

Clarion felt sick to her stomach. Poor Viola had to travel by the simplest means possible. Meanwhile, Tinker Bell and her friends were going to make the same trek with the benefit of a fully stocked pirate ship which offered every comfort and a great deal more protection. Her first thought was to apologize to the summoner, though Viola would never complain.

Her second thought was to commission Fairy Mary to design and build several fairy sized frigate air ships complete with crew quarters, a cargo deck, a galley with a gimbaled stove and of course, Nyx's unique methods of fairy defenses. Even a small version of such a vessel would have been of great service to poor Viola.

 **~O~**

A few days later Tinker Bell announced that modifications were complete. Or at least, mostly complete. "We can leave now and finish the rest on the way," she informed Queen Clarion. "All that remains are the crew compartments and that won't take very long."

Nervous, Clarion gave her blessing to Tinker Bell and her group of close knit friends. She handed them a detailed map with the best course to the tower where they were to "negotiate" with the "wizard" for the counter spell that would undo the curse. "Follow this map and you will arrive quickly at your destination without being spotted by the humans," she told them. "Do as you are told and do not enrage the wizard or he may turn his considerable magical talents against you."

"We understand," Tinker Bell replied.

The next morning the frigate was loaded up with treasures that were beyond the dreams of avarice. The fairies had no need for such material wealth, but they kept it to use against pirates who searched for their home. In particular, Captain James Hook. Now it would be used to buy protection for Pixie Hollow once again, only now it was to protect against Tinker Bell's infuriating curiosity.

By midday the ship was underway and Clarion watched, hoping, wishing actually, that this would bring about a peaceful end to Tinker Bell's journey into Pixie Hollow's past.


	20. Chapter 20

**20.**

It was a lovely day. The frigate, which Zarina humorously named _The Pirate Fairy_ , was well underway at full sail. Never Land receded in the distance as the band of fairies sailed first to the east and then to the south. Zarina, having once captained this ship, took over that role once again. Tinker Bell was her first officer. Vidia was the helmsman, taking the wheel and when necessary pushing the vessel forward with her talent. Iridessa acted as navigator, using her skills with the light of the sun, moon and stars to guide them to their destination. Periwinkle and Gliss volunteered to be ship's cooks while Spike volunteered to sit in the crow's nest where she could kick back and do as little as possible. The others took to work maintaining the sails and the ship in general.

Rosetta, as usual, was the first to complain about something. "Tinker Bell, are you sure this ship is safe? I don't want to end up with a shaved head like Bobble and Clank. Or you."

 **~O~**

When the vessel was first brought to Pixie Hollow, several fairies took to cleaning it and preparing for storage. Among them were many tinkers including Clank, Bobble and Tinker Bell. What they learned almost immediately was that the lower decks reeked. While at sea fresh water was at a premium so the crew almost never bathed. That horrid smell had worked its way into their wool clothing and hammocks in the crew quarters.

While the fairies were cleaning out the fetid stench they discovered something else that plagued the pirate crew. Lice. Once the fairies handled the infested clothing the bugs made their new homes in the tiny pixie's hair. Only Zarina knew the answer to ridding the boat of lice.

Pirates captured their pee and soaked their clothing in it to kill the bugs before washing those same clothes in seawater. The fairies found themselves scrubbing the entire ship with the awful stuff. The tinkers crafted special isolation suits so no one would have to actually touch such foul fluids. All of the pirates' clothing and bedding had to be burned along with anything else that might harbor the bugs or their eggs.

As for the hair, well anyone who had taken part in the cleanup had to have their head shaved. At least until someone discovered that olive oil or tea tree oils acted as natural delousing agents though by then it was too late for many. It took quite a while before everyone's full heads of hair grew back.

Rosetta, of course, had enjoyed teasing anyone who had suffered the indignity of a shaved head. The red haired garden fairy regularly flaunted her lovely curls while the others flitted about with bald heads. That was until she learned that her own long flowing locks had become a breeding ground for the little buggers. Rosetta tried to swallow her pride, but couldn't. She had to be chased and then held down by several fairies until she was shaved totally bald.

Determined not to suffer any further embarrassment or indignity she remained holed up in her home and refused to leave until her lovely red hair had returned to its former luxuriant state.

 **~O~**

"Yes, Rosetta. The ship is cleaned from stem to stern," Tinker Bell groused in return, absentmindedly touching her hair as she did. "Funny you didn't mention yourself."

"It never happened. Is that clear! It! Never! Happened!"

"Whatever you say, Ro. By the way, was that a birthmark on the back of your head?"

"What?! Where?! What does it look like? Is it ugly? Tell me it's not ugly!"

Tink and Zarina cracked into fits of giggles.

"Oh, ha ha! Not funny, Tinker Bell," Rosetta scowled. "My hair is not a laughing matter. It's the crowning jewel of my effervescent beauty. _And don't you forget that!_ "

Rosetta cringed a bit, recalling how unpleasant she looked with a shaved head. The garden fairy covered all of her mirrors while her hair grew back, nervous that it might not. Like Tinker Bell, she began absentmindedly touching and combing the red flowing strands with her fingers, caressing them like a beloved and irreplaceable treasure.

 **~O~**

While crossing the English Channel Silvermist noticed that hardly a sailing ship could be seen. Instead, all the ships were made of metal, had no sails but in their place were stacks which belched thick, black smoke. "What's happened? Where are all the wooden ships?" she asked.

Zarina looked a bit downcast. "They're gone." The Age of Sail was no more. As she explained, modern ships were now built out of metal, were powered by steam and could travel faster and farther than any wooden sailing ship. No more were vessels and their crews at the mercy of Mother Nature and her fickle winds. Modern propulsion meant that even in the middle of the doldrums a steamship could make good time.

Tinker Bell, sensing that something was wrong, put her hand on Zarina's shoulder. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Not really. It's just that… well, on a wooden ship like this sailing was a grand adventure," Zarina commented. "Crews worked above decks in the sunshine and sea air. Salt spray in your face and the crashing of the waves adding a soundtrack to the daily routine. Sure the work was backbreaking but it was a test of will. These ships tried men's souls. It was you against the tempest of the elements with nothing but a few planks of wood between you and a watery grave."

"Uh… okay?"

"Now look down there, Tink. See those ironclads with the belching smoke and churning paddles? Do you know where the hardest work is? Down below in the lower decks. The engine room, filled with laborers whose only job is to shovel coal into boilers to make steam. That's it. Just shovel and throw, shovel and throw, shovel and throw. No sunlight, no salty sea air, not even the sound of the ocean to keep you company. Just a grimy, dimly lit room next to furnaces kept burning bright with fires hotter than the pits of Hell itself. I feel sorry for them. Where is the adventure? The courage? The comradery? Something wonderful has been lost, Tink. The great life on the ocean blue is gone. All that's left is faceless progress."

"Uh, in case you haven't noticed, Zarina, that's kind of what you and I do," Tinker Bell reminded her. "Our inventions have transformed Pixie Hollow and certainly for the better. I don't think anyone laments the progress we've brought to our world. Well, except for a few holdouts who will remain nameless." Tink's gaze turned briefly to Rosetta, who refused the tinker's new machinery for the old fashioned methods of coloring leaves and flower petals.

Zarina sighed. "I know. It's just… don't get me wrong, coming home to Pixie Hollow and being welcomed and appreciated by everyone was the greatest thing to happen to me. But when I commanded this old wooden ship with my pirate crew we followed no rules but our own. That was true freedom, Tinker Bell!"

"Didn't the crew betray you and try to send you to Davey Jones' Locker?"

"That's not the point. This was the good life, Tink. I've never felt so unhindered."

Tinker Bell stared down at the ships churning the waters of the Channel. "I think I understand. Not being able to go to the mainland hurt in so many ways. I wanted to be something other than a tinker, anything, just so I could leave Pixie Hollow and explore a different world. That's what's happening to you. This is your mainland."

Zarina chuckled. "Ironic isn't it? The fairy who discovered how to change your talent is the one who desperately wants to be something other than a fairy? Well, not forever, but…"

"But it's nice to have the option."

"Yeah."

"Well, Queen Clarion is anything if not open minded. Maybe she'll put you in charge of Pixie Hollow's first and only flying frigate. Whenever we need this vessel you'll be the one to command her?"

Zarina was most taken by Tink's suggestion. She certainly loved being a pixie dust alchemist, but her time at sea opened a whole new world to her, one that she could not easily dismiss. Now it could be possible for her to enjoy both of her passions.

Silvermist broke the alchemist from her reverie. "Zarina, are those ironclads down there the reason James and his pirates wanted to make this ship fly so badly?"

"Yeah. Exactly." Zarina's captured frigate was actually, according to the Royal Navy, a sixth rate vessel known as a post ship with all of its twenty eight guns disposed on the main deck, quarterdeck and forecastle where they could be used in all weathers. The classification, sixth rate, was part of system used by the Royal Navy and originally devised during the late Stuart Era around 1604. It was heavily revised by Secretary to the Admiralty Samuel Pepys in 1677 and his system remained in place, modified as needed, for several centuries.

The rating system categorized ships according to the number of guns they carried. This corresponded to the number of men needed for the crew and accompanying supplies. First rate ships were the largest, carrying more than one hundred guns on three gun decks. Second rate ships also had three gun decks but carried between 90 – 98 guns. Third rate ships possessed two gun decks carrying 64 – 80 weapons.

Vessels rated first, second and third were also considered ships-of-the-line. The name was derived from a tactic used at sea in which warships from opposing powers lined up and as their lines passed would deliver withering broadsides into each other. Such large vessels carried both the necessary batteries and sturdy enough hulls to deal such devastating attacks while absorbing the same in kind. Some forth rate ships with two decks and forty guns were also considered ships of the line, but by the mid eighteen hundreds few remained.

The smaller fifth and sixth rate ships were the frigates and post ships, vessels far too small to survive the line of battle. Instead, such vessels proved essential for lighting attacks, blockade duty and acting as couriers.

 _The Pirate Fairy_ was one such vessel. It was full rigged (three masts each square rigged) and possessed three decks: the main deck, the berth deck and the orlop deck which sat over the ship's hold. Built atop the main deck were two smaller decks, one fore and one aft. At the stern was the quarterdeck under which the captain had his cabin and atop which was the wheel, giving the helmsman a commanding view of the ocean ahead. Small landing boats hung from the outside of the quarterdeck and were known as quarter boats. At the fore was the other small deck known as the forecastle, pronounced fo'c'sle (foke sull). Atop both decks additional guns were positioned, rounding out the ship's full complement.

Such a vessel had once been an essential part of the Royal Navy until The Age of Sail came to an end. Even pirates could no longer survive on such vessels against the ironclads with their armor, powerful guns and steam driven engines. Wooden sailing frigates, which had once been considered fast and agile were now slow and ponderous by comparison.

"James had the idea of making this ship fly with pixie dust so he could bypass these new warships that patrolled the seas," Zarina explained. "Even shore batteries are more advanced now, with greater range. A wooden ship would be blown to kindling before it could ever get near port. But no one would expect a full rigged frigate to appear out of the sky, much less one with pirates looking to loot precious treasures. London, Paris, Cairo, Washington, D.C. No city on earth would be safe."

"Yes, we know. We heard the shanty," Vidia groused.

"Oh, you were aboard ship for that?"

"Yeah, and it wasn't pretty. Pirates singing and dancing like they were part of some stage play. I mean who would pay to see that? What's next? A modern Major General philosophizing about being animal, vegetable or mineral?"

"Oh, Vidia," Tinker Bell sighed.

"Land ho!" Spike cried out from her perch.

Zarina peered through the human spyglass which Tinker Bell had expertly secured to a rotating arm. "It's the town of De Panne, I think. In Belgium. But we're going to pass right over it."

"They'll see us!" Fawn declared.

"No they won't. Okay everyone man the sails, prepare to come about to a new heading on a port tack. Prepare to turn the ship to starboard."

"Uh, how exactly do we do that?" Rosetta asked.

"Oh boy."

* * *

 **I had to do so much research about old sailing frigates, and then I had to find some way to cram it all in without it feeling forced.**

 **Okay, it's forced. But hey, it's all for you, my loyal fans. Hey? Where did you go?**


	21. Chapter 21

**21.**

 _Dear readers: please note that I made an error in describing the proper tack for the starboard heading. It has been corrected in the previous chapter and has been clarified in this chapter.  
_

* * *

De Panne was a small Belgian city near the border with France. _The Pirate Fairy_ was about fly directly overhead and reveal itself to all the world. To the starboard was an empty beach far enough from prying eyes for the wooden sailing vessel to make landfall without being seen. To accomplish this the _Fairy_ had to make a port tack, except that no one other than Zarina really knew what that meant or how to accomplish it. With land looming Zarina busily filled in her comrades.

Tack is the boats relation to the headwinds. Tacking is the process of turning a ship to either port or starboard in which the bow, during part of the turn, faces directly into the oncoming winds until the ship completes its turn. A seafaring ship cannot, under any circumstance, sail directly to into a headwind. Doing so is called putting the ship "in irons."

Instead, ships proceed forward by sailing at an angle to the headwinds and the sails themselves are turned so the vessel may continue pressing forward. This orientation is called "close-hauled." Since the ship will take the path of least resistance it will move in the direction of its keel as the hull cuts through the water (or atmosphere as the case may be). While sailing into the wind, however, any ship will list as the wind pushes against the ship causing it to lean.

"Questions?"

"Why is it called a port tack when we're turning to starboard?" Iridessa asked.

"Tack is the orientation of the ship to the headwind. Right now we are on a starboard tack, with the winds coming over the starboard bow. By turning starboard the winds will come over the port bow, so it's called a port tack."

Fawn wanted to know if tacking was anything like jibing, something that Bobble had them do when floating towards Lizzy's home a few summers previous. It was similar, jibing, though, referred to turning the ship when the winds were from the stern. But on a square rigged ship like _The Pirate Fairy_ , the procedure was called weathering.

With time of the essence Zarina raced through the correct procedures and grilled her crew so they knew exactly what was expected of them. With too little time and too much work she had to accept that not everyone knew their responsibilities fully and instead she would keep watch over them to correct any mistakes.

 _The Pirate Fairy_ was to make a turn to the south west to avoid the town below and then make its course for the mountain range where the Wizard lived in his castle. The physical demands on the tiny fairies were extreme and even Gliss and Periwinkle joined the others above to help out. Zarina flitted about checking on everyone's work and offered bits of advice or corrections but was generally pleased with how well everyone was performing under pressure.

The frigate turned, slowly putting De Panne off to port. The captain pitched in so that the ship turned directly into the headwinds as it tacked to its new course. While sailing directly into the winds the _Fairy_ had no propulsion and was moving both forward and turning to starboard entirely on momentum.

"Come on. Come on," Captain Zarina muttered, as if trying to will her ship to complete its turn before stalling in the oncoming winds. She watched and waited. The sails were now in their proper configuration and De Panne continued to slide across their bow.

Seconds passed like minutes and minutes like hours while the ship was in irons. Captain Zarina felt her ship slowing. The turn was not yet complete and it was losing momentum at an alarming rate.

"Helm, give us a nudge," she ordered Vidia.

"Aye, captain." Vidia flew up to a position even with the sails and created a whirlwind that forced the ship to starboard.

"Not too fast," Zarina yelled, as the ship listed a bit much for comfort. "We don't want to capsize."

Vidia slowed her winds and prodded the ship over until the _Fairy_ was close hauled. The headwinds were now sufficiently coming from the port to allow the ship to move under its own power.

"Alright, well done. To your station helmsman."

Vidia returned to the wheel and made a steady course, watching the ship's compass and following Iridessa's precise navigational readings.

Captain Zarina then gathered everyone around the wheel to congratulate them on a job well done. She was especially appreciative that they needed so very little supervision. "We'll be doing plenty more of that as we sail to our destination, so you'll have quite a few opportunities to master these new skills."

 **~O~**

The flying frigate moved at a modest but deliberate pace, one that kept everyone busy at their posts making small adjustments to get the most out of her sails. Periwinkle and Gliss came up from below decks with fresh baked goodies and glasses of chilled mouse milk to nourish those who worked on deck and high in the riggings. It was a brief if refreshing departure from the physically demanding labor required to operate and manage this hulking human ship.

More than once Tinker Bell and her friends thought about the ironclads they saw in the English Channel and silently wished that they could be sailing one of those way up here in the clouds. At least the work wouldn't be so backbreaking. Then they remembered what Zarina told them. All the work was done in confined spaces down below, with tons of coal shoveled into hot furnaces to keep the steam engines revved.

Maybe this wasn't so bad after all.

Fawn and Silvermist peered over the sides of the ship from time to time and noticed that they were passing over quite a few farms, vineyards and roads. Roads which were active with traffic at this time of day.

"If they look up those humans will see us," Silvermist observed. "We need to hide ourselves."

"Sil, can you give us some cloud cover?" Rosetta suggested.

"I've never done anything larger than a few rainclouds for the gardens," Sil remarked. "But I'll give it a try."

The tiny water fairy took flight and dove under the hull of the vessel. Spreading out her arms Silvermist called upon her talent to form a mist out of the water in the air around her. At first it wasn't much, but given some effort she formed a larger mist, zipping back and forth to try and cover the entire hull from prying eyes. Her efforts were met with success, but at a cost.

Less than an hour later she returned topside gasping for breath and looking drained. To cover the ship successfully for the entire flight was not practical. It wasn't enough to form a cloud to encase the ship, The Pirate Fairy would just move right through it. Someone would have to be posted ahead of the vessel at all times to maintain the heavy cloud cover and long term it proved to be quite exhausting for an experienced water fairy like Silvermist.

"Well, any other bright ideas?" Vidia groused.

"What about those wispy clouds up there," Iridessa suggested, pointing to some thin and elongated cirrus clouds also known as mares' tails which stretched across the sky.

Zarina spied them and decided to try and use them to obscure the ship. Those same mares' tails also worried her. According to her crew they always preceded a storm.

 **~O~**

 _The Pirate Fairy_ was moving at a brisk clip, ascending to higher altitudes to find cover. The winds propelling the ship were now blowing from the aft across the ship and the higher the ship sailed the stronger those winds became.

"Can't we slow down?" Rosetta groaned. "These breezes are playing havoc with my delicate curls."

"Oh put a sock in it, Ro," Vidia grumbled.

"Humph, fast flyers. You know just because you have thick and coarse hair doesn't mean you can tell me to shut up," Rosetta screamed.

"Uh, Ro, say that again," Fawn asked.

"Gladly. Vidia has ugly hair. I mean you can see the split ends from here."

"Hey!"

"No, not that. Look. Hooh! I can see your breath. And mine," Fawn clarified.

Tinker Bell folder her arms around her body. "It does feel a bit chilled now."

Spike didn't notice it as much, even though she was not at this moment a winter fairy. It just came with the territory. "You'll be fine."

"No, I'm feeling it, too," Iridessa replied, having to talk a little louder over the blowing gales.

"Keep going," Zarina yelled. "We're not going to let a little chill keep us from that cover."

 _The Pirate Fairy_ began to falter, yawing a bit to the right. Zarina looked over and witnessed Vidia having trouble at the wheel. "Snap to, helmsman!"

"I'm on it. I'm on it." Vidia adjusted the wheel to put the ship back on course. "Sorry. I felt a little, I don't know, light headed I think."

"Need to take a break?"

"I'm fine," Vidia snapped, irritated by the accusation.

"Alright, we are making good time, let's keep pushing for those clouds," Zarina yelled out, trying to keep her crew focused and their spirits up.

"Look at that!" Iridessa gasped.

"What?"

"Can't you see it?"

"Yeah, me too."

The blue sky above them wasn't quite so blue. It was turning dark.

"Is it night?" Fawn asked.

"In the middle of the afternoon?" Rosetta replied.

"No, the sky below us is still bright and blue," Iridessa replied, pointing to the horizons. "It's just above us that the night sky is appearing."

"I have a bad feeling about this," Tinker Bell gulped.

"It's just your imagination," Zarina chimed in. Though in the captain's private thoughts her own doubts crept up. How high were they? Why was the night sky appearing during broad daylight? She thought about abandoning the clouds above when she heard a thunk. Spike, who had been positioned in the crow's nest had fallen from her perch and crash landed on the deck below. She had tried to fly down but lost control and had to settle for a controlled crash landing.

"What happened?"

"My wings," she clamored. "My wings are icing over."

Zarina examined them and felt the intense cold turning those gossamer wings brittle hard. It was getting very cold. Very much like the Winter Woods. Zarina was about to hand out dust for winter talents to everyone when the ship began to yaw, the bow turning away from the clouds.

"I haven't given an order yet, helmsman!" Zarina shouted. At the wheel she saw Vidia nearly unconscious. She was clinging to the wheel as it began to turn on its own, the rudder buffeted by the high winds.

"Zarina, we're too high," Tinker Bell yelled. She was taking deep breaths, gasping for air, as everyone was now doing. As Zarina was now doing. _When did that happen?_ It happened when they weren't looking. The frigate was now plowing ahead at terrific speeds. No one noticed that the winds were more than a gale because the forward motion of the ship gave a false reading of wind speeds. Vidia didn't make a report because… because… because she was losing consciousness? Then there was Spike. And now Tinker Bell.

"Wh- What about your wings?" the captain asked her first officer.

"They feel... feel… co-." Tinker Bell blacked out, her eyes rolling back into her head and her body falling limp on the deck. Zarina's senses and mind began to fail her. Even breathing as deep and as fast as she was didn't seem to help.

"I've… I've taken us too… too high." Captain Zarina tried to flutter up to the wheel but had more trouble than expected. Her wings were icing over, both weighing her down and impairing her ability to control her flight against the winds that raced across the weather deck. Everyone was succumbing to the thin air.

A terrible sound caught the captain's attention. She looked up. The mainsail had torn to shreds. Then she watched as the royal did the same. "Save my ship. Save my crew." Those words echoed in her thoughts as Captain Zarina tried to remain conscious enough to pitch the ship down and out of danger.

Her mind couldn't concentrate. She couldn't trust her instincts. Or her senses. "Which lever do I pull?" Zarina landed on one that looked familiar. Was this it? She squeezed the trigger and pushed as hard as she could. Or was she pushing at all? Zarina couldn't tell.

Then, as if an answer to a prayer, the darkening sky above slowly turned blue.

"Yes. I did it."

Then it slowly turned green.

"Green? When did the sky turn green?"

Zarina then passed out from lack of oxygen. _The Pirate Fairy_ had pitched downward, but was out of control. With powerful winds driving it the frigate was diving towards the earth below at fatal speeds. Winds swept across the deck and pushed anything not secured right off, including the majority of the passed out fairy crew.

Had any human by chance craned their head up and peered through a spyglass they might have seen an old sailing frigate plunging out of the skies surrounded by its fairy crew, unconscious and freefalling to their doom.

* * *

 **Don't you just love a good cliffhanger?**


	22. Chapter 22

**22.**

The hypoxia was having an effect on Zarina, her mind playing images that weren't really there. They danced through her mind like a stage play at Fairy Tale Theater. Oh what a grand adventure she was having inside her head while around her all hell was breaking loose.

A howling wind. Timbers cracking and splintering. Hemp ropes and rigging snapping while metal cleats tore from their mounts.

These sounds stirred the unconscious fairy. She opened her eyes, recovering as the atmosphere became more favorable to breathing. It took a moment to gather her wits, but when she did Captain Zarina stared down the bow and saw the distant French countryside rather than the bonnie blue colors of the midafternoon sky. It all came back to her. The ship went too high and the crew passed out. She had managed to angle the ship downward, but now they were plunging and out of control.

Zarina turned her head to avoid the direct onrush of air. She could barely move as the powerful winds pinned her to the bulwark of the quarterdeck. She felt like someone caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place. The winds felt hard as rock with the unyielding oak of her ship the hard place.

She tried to beat her wings furiously, but to no avail. Suddenly the cleats holding some rigging broke free and came right at her. She rolled her body out of the way. A powerful thud and a moment later Zarina was staring into the gaping hole gouged out of the solid English Oak. It was twice her size and nearly as deep. "What have I gotten us into?" she quietly asked herself.

The captain refused to be defeated. Unable to fly and held flat by the plowing winds Zarina instead took to crawling down the bulwark and then across the decking. She pushed with her legs and wings and pulled with her arms. Fighting the slipstream took all the she had and Zarina was feeling the exhaustion by the time she reached the edge of the quarterdeck. She scanned the main deck and forecastle for any of her friends.

"Where is everyone?" the captain yelled, though it did little good. The sound of the winds rushing past was like a deafening roar. When Zarina opened her mouth to call out to her crew her lungs nearly exploded from the forced air rushing into them. She had to turn her head to scream out to her friends.

"Tinker Bell! Spike! Rosetta! Anyone! Sound off!"

"We're here!" came a voice. Maybe, she couldn't be certain.

"Hello! Who's there?"

"Down here!"

She glanced downward and saw the quivering forms of Gliss and Periwinkle holding on for dear life in the doorway to the lower deck. They were fighting the winds as much as she was.

"What happened?" They asked her. Clearly the thin air had temporarily rendered them unconscious, and like her, had just regain consciousness.

"Later! I need help taking control of the ship!"

The little fairies struggled to move out of the galley. Like Zarina, the high winds felt like a vice holding them against the superstructure of the ship. Zarina kept her eyes on the wheel which was spinning back and forth. Then she looked ahead and saw the ground getting bigger and bigger. Another cracking sound. The bowsprit was missing entirely. The foremast had broken in two and its top half had fallen onto the weather deck. Sails for all the masts were either torn off completely or in the process of being shredded.

Even if the three of them could rescue the ship, their little adventure seemed to be coming to a quick end.

"We're not going to make it," Gliss shrieked. "We're falling to fast."

"You stow that bilge right now," Zarina shouted back. "We are not going to lose this ship or our lives. Now get your barnacled backsides up here this instant."

Sufficiently chastened Gliss and Periwinkle continued to climb up the railing until they were even with the ship's wheel. Periwinkle let go. The winds punched her tiny body, shooting it backwards until she grabbed hold of the wheel. "I've got it!" She yelled right before it spun her around. "I think it's got me!"

Zarina pointed to the pitch control rod. "Gliss, you have to get to that lever and pull back on it."

Gliss, normally bubbly and cheerful, stared at the lever as if it meant certain death. "Are you crazy?!"

"Pull back on the lever, it will right the ship."

Gliss stared at the control rod and handle. On any other day this would be an easy trip, a quick flutter of the wings. At this moment the short distance was the most dangerous one she would ever stare down. "Okay!" The little white haired fairy took a deep breath. Gulped hard and let go.

She missed. Gliss' hair was swept across her face and she could not see her destination in that instant.

The little fairy was sucked across the quarterdeck, through the railings and overboard, if it could be called overboard. Zarina's heart sank. At least Gliss still had her wings, she could fly to safety. Determined to bring the ship to safety, too, the captain kept pushing herself closer to the pitch control lever. She neared it, but a small splinter from the wooden plank she grasped came loose and she tumbled end over end several feet away before was able to find purchase once more.

A quick glance over the bow and tiny buildings were starting to appear against the landscape. They were getting closer. Too close. Was this it? Should she just tell Periwinkle to let go and let the ship smash into the ground below?

A bird whipped past her. She ducked her head to avoid it. A quick look over her shoulder revealed the bird spinning out of control until it finally recovered. It squawked angrily.

"Yeah, same to you. Hey, what?" A yellow shimmering light appeared in the distance approaching the ship from astern. It grew closer, buffeting by the winds but never losing ground. She recognized it. A fairy. One of her crew. But who was it?

Who was it? _What a stupid question_. There was only one fairy who could keep up. "Vidia!"

 **~O~**

The fast flyer beat her wings faster than she ever had before, grabbing air and thrusting herself forward at a defiantly reckless pace. Her prize: the lever. She could see a glimmering glow attached to the wheel. Someone was trying to control the ship's rudder and failing badly. But none of that mattered as long as _The Pirate Fairy_ was dropping like a rock.

Undaunted Vidia shot over the railing, up the quarterdeck and wrapped her arms and legs around the pitch control lever. She squeezed the trigger, releasing it. Vidia spread out her wings to catch air and instantly the lever pulled back with her until it locked into place.

 _The Pirate Fairy_ 's bow began to turn skyward, nosing up to the horizon and then to a bonnie blue color. Then those same clouds came into view. The ship was now pointing almost straight up. The howling winds which had plagued Zarina and Periwinkle ceased, then, incredibly began to come at them from behind.

"We've stalled," Vidia shouted. The frizzy looking clouds above them began to slide off to the portside indicating that the ship had lost its momentum and was now yawing to starboard.

"Uh oh," Vidia gulped.

"Peri, help me take control of the helm," Zarina shouted, joining Tink's sister at the wheel.

 _The Pirate Fairy_ shuddered as the horizon crossed in front of it sideways to the deck and once more the green earth began to rush up to them. This time, Vidia pulled back on the stick gently while Peri and Zarina fought the wheel. They were quickly joined by Gliss who had recovered and made her way back to the frigate.

"Don't forget about me," she shouted, taking hold of one of the spokes.

Vidia was less aggressive, shifting the stick with a light touch. The green earth below them gradually gave way to the horizon once again and then to a blue sky ahead. Vidia set the control stick to neutral, righting the vessel once and for all. Zarina turned the ship first to port and then starboard and back, zig zagging to bleed off the momentum until the frigate slowed to a gentle pace.

"Yippee! We did it!" Gliss shouted, grabbing hold of Periwinkle and nearly shaking the poor girl to pieces.

"What happened to the others?" Vidia asked.

"They were swept over," Zarina told her. "They'll probably flutter down to meet us, I hope."

"There they are!" Periwinkle shouted. As if by fate the first to join them was Peri's sister, Tinker Bell. Right behind her was Rosetta, Fawn and Iridessa. It was a tearful reunion for the small crew. The each grasped and hugged each other in joyful recognition that each had survived no worse for wear. Well, except perhaps for Rosetta's wits, which she assured everyone she had been frightened out of.

"Hey, anyone seen Silvermist?" Tinker Bell asked.

"I thought she was with you?" Zarina asked.

"We couldn't find her," Tink replied. "She isn't with the _Fairy_?"

As if on cue, a tiny humanoid body dropped out of the sky, missing the frigate by a few inches. It was Silvermist, and she was screaming out for assistance.

"...hhhhhhHHHHHEEEEEEELLLLLLLPPPPPPMMMMMMEEEEeeeeeee!"

Vidia face palmed. "Not again. I'll get her."

 **~O~**

Silvermist tumbled head over heels as she whipped by the now steady ship. She had called out for help, but for some reason the others all just stood along the railing… watching. What were they thinking?!

The water fairy cried out from the very depth of her lungs for help, watching the human sailing ship recede in the distance. A glimmering yellow trail appeared. Then it grew closer. Yes! One of them was coming to rescue her. They still cared.

It was Vidia.

Silvermist reached out to grab the purple clothed fairy, but Vidia didn't extend her hands. Instead she folded them across her body. Her face was contorted into a deep scowl of unbridled disapproval.

"What are you waiting for? Take my hands. Help me. Vidia!"

Vidia just grumbled, rolled her eyes and grumbled some more. "You! Are! A! Fairy!" she shouted back, punctuating her response for emphasis. "You have wings. You can fly."

Silvermist's eyes opened wide as if shocked by this incredible revelation. Then she twisted her head to peer over her shoulders. "Ha Ha Ha Ha! I forgot!" Sil beat her wings and slowed her descent, alighting atop a tall wine glass. The edge was wet and she slipped, falling in. PLOOMP!

"Oh, why me?" Vidia groused.

Nearby were two humans, a male and a female. Both were fairly young. And trim. And wrapped in each other's arms. He was topless. She was very close to it. He spoke something with a smoothness to his voice that suggested he was seducing her. She giggled coyly before kissing him on the lips in return.

"Oh…, joy."

"Vidia!" Silvermist called out. "I'm trapped. I know. I'll drink my way out of this."

"What? NO! Sil, don't!"

It was too late. Silvermist plunged her head below the water level and began taking big gulps of the pungent tasting red stuff. She surfaced to take a breath and give Vidia an update. "There's a lot more here than I thought. But don't worry, I'll finish it off." Sil then plunged underneath again to gulp down more of the red wine.

When Silvermist emerged a second time Vidia didn't bother pointing out the blatant irony that the girl was a water fairy in a glass of liquid. She just grabbed Sil by the collar of her dress and spirited her back to the _Fairy_.

 **~O~**

"Here she is," Vidia announced callously. "For better or worse."

Silvermist touched down on deck and stumbled over to her group of friends. Her clothing was somehow stained a reddish color. She wore a silly grin on her face and seemed to have trouble keeping her balance. She also reeked of something.

"What happened?" Fawn asked.

"She forgot she could fly. Then fell into a glass of wine," Vidia explained. The fast flyer turned to go back to her spot at the helm before adding, "Oh and she tried to drink her way out of that glass, too."

Silvermist wavered this way and that. She hiccupped and burped a little. "And it would have wor… hic …orked, too."

Zarina, while relieved that Silvermist was unharmed, also groaned at how her comrade was acting under the influence of so much human alcohol. She instructed Sil to sleep it off below decks.

Sil plopped her hand against her face in a kind of sloppy salute. "Aye, Aye, Skipper." She took one step and collapsed on the deck right there, almost instantly falling into a deep, wine induced slumber.


	23. Chapter 23

**23.**

"Silvermist is stowed down below," Periwinkle told Zarina.

"Yeah, she's sleeping in her bunk," Gliss chattered. "And when she wakes up she'll be surrounded by all those pretty flowers. Isn't that great?"

"Flowers? That's my bunk," Rosetta complained.

Peri sighed. "Gliss, I told you that wasn't Sil's bunk."

"But flowers grow alongside the riverbank," she replied.

"It's okay. It's okay," Zarina yelled. "Just get back to work in the kitchen. Something tells me we're going to need plenty of energy to fix this mess."

"Uh, that's going to be a problem," Periwinkle said. The galley was in complete disarray. When the ship went vertical and then nearly rolled over much of their stores turned with it. The entire kitchen was dusted with flour, cornmeal and anything else that wasn't nailed down. Taking it down would be extra difficult since some of the oils and honey they brought had splattered everywhere pretty much making the flour and everything stick to whatever it touched. On top of that, all of the cooking dishes and utensils were flung every which way. "Gliss was nearly skewered by a, uh, skewer."

"On the bright side, all the fruit, bread and anything already cooked survived," Gliss said cheerfully.

Zarina ordered it passed around, but only in small rations, at least until they could clean up the kitchen, take inventory and possibly resupply.

More problems.

The bowsprit was gone along with the spritsail attached to it. Of course, that was only part of the problem. The bowsprit helped to support the foremast, keeping it from falling backwards. Without it, the foremast had done just that, breaking in two nearer the main the deck. The mast dangled over the side of the frigate, its ratlines or rope ladders keeping it from falling.

At least the spanker sail was in good shape, though it was hardly consolation.

Could it get any worse?

Tinker Bell returned with her damage report. "I have good news and bad news. And really bad news. The good news is that the quarter boats survived the trip intact, complete with oars and sails. Now the bad news." The fore mast was a total loss. That much was undeniable. Unfortunately, the main mast showed some signs of cracking due to the stresses it was placed under. Furthermore, several planks on the hull had pulled free from the framing timbers or were missing in full. The prow also took some minor damage when the bowsprit broke off, but that was the bad news. "The really bad news is that keel has split. It's not fatal, yet, but I'm not sure how long the _Fairy_ will hold up at full sail."

"Well, considering how many of our sails are torn up or are just plain missing I doubt this ship will ever see full sail again. Thank you, Tinker Bell."

The keel. That was bad. Truly bad. The keel was the lengthy timber which is laid first when constructing a ship. It is essentially the spine or backbone of the ship. From the keel, framing timbers are attached and look like a ribcage. The entire ship's structural integrity relies on the integrity of the keel, including every bulkhead, timber and plank. With that kind of damage _The Pirate Fairy_ would never be seaworthy again.

"Uh, with some help I might be able to push some of the hull planks into place again," Tink offered as a ray of hope. "We could reinforce the keel and with some canvas taken from the humans overnight when they are all asleep I think the sails could be salvaged."

Zarina nodded approvingly. "Do it. Take whomever you need."

What a disaster this was turning out to be. Zarina, who had successfully commanded a pirate ship across the waters of Never Land for a full year couldn't command it while airborne for a few days. Perhaps that was because a seafaring ship wasn't meant to fly. No, she should have taken that into consideration. The rules up here weren't necessarily the same as in the ocean blue.

"Maybe taking this command was a bad idea," she groaned.

"Nonsense," Tinker Bell said. Tink, who had been organizing a work detail for all the repairs was standing nearby and overhead Zarina's self-accusations. "We all make mistakes, Zarina. All of us. And I should know, I've made more than my fair share. But I don't worry about it. Instead, I let every failure teach me something so I can succeed next time."

"And what did I learn this time?"

"Well, that it gets really cold and windy at higher altitudes." Tink suggested. "When you get up near those wispy clouds day turns into night, although I'm not sure why. Oh, and we learned that the air gets too thin to breath up there, too."

"Why would that be important?"

"It's a great scientific discovery," Tinker Bell announced. "No one, not human or fairy, knows about this. And maybe it will prove useful later. Maybe we can find an altitude where we can use those winds to our advantage."

"Maybe, but we're fairies, not scientists. I know you're trying to cheer me up, Tink, but right now my concern is getting this ship and her crew to the Wizard's Castle and back home safe and sound. Now let's get this vessel back to, if not Bristol-Fashion, then at least shipshape."

Tinker Bell, in a show of unflagging loyalty and respect, snapped to attention, gave a proper salute and replied smartly, "Aye, Captain."

 **~O~**

Zarina pitched in, helping to clean up and repair the ship. _The Pirate Fairy_ hung in the air adrift and shifted at the whim of the breezes. It was daylight and they dared not descend any nearer the ground for fear of being easy to spot. Vidia, who had recovered Silvermist, mentioned that at this altitude the ship was more like a spot in the sky and that only a perceptive human would take notice.

That was good information. Zarina wished she had known that sooner.

 **~O~**

When night fell the fairies launched one of their quarter boats and sailed it down near a small town. It was close to midnight and with only a half moon in the sky their boat was hardly visible. Not that it mattered. No one was awake at this hour.

Tinker Bell and the others visited each shop looking for things they needed, taking sturdy canvas to repair the sails, pieces of strong timbers, several bundles of rope at 300 fathoms each and of course plenty of food and water for the crew. Not wanting to steal, the fairies left pieces of gold or jewelry in place of all they took. The human inhabitants might know who pilfered their belongings, but at least no one could deny they were decent enough to pay for it.

The fairy crew worked throughout the night reinforcing the keel. They took shifts, some labored while others slept a few hours. By morning this most critical of repairs was completed. The fairies enjoyed a hearty breakfast before attempting to bolster the integrity of the mainmast. If that collapsed the ship might not make it in a timely fashion, or at all.

Recovering the sails was next on the agenda and by days end they had been able to repair both the course (main) and royal sails of the mainmast and the course of the mizzen. "It will have to do," Zarina sighed. There was some debate over whether to cut the foremast loose, but Tinker Bell suggested they stow it aboard ship. "I think I can rebuild it," she claimed. "But I'll need some more wood and plenty of rope." She would also need more canvas to make new sails.

The salvage operation took a total of five and a half days to complete. Surely the queen would worry if they were overdue. Unfortunately, the captain was unable to spare a single person or quarter boat to send a message.

When repairs were finished the frigate's three remaining sails were unfurled and _The Pirate Fairy_ was underway again. Progress was much slower than before thanks to the loss of the foremast and the bowsprit. Vidia, though, had an idea. A good nudge from her winds could help the _Fairy_ along. Tinker Bell, however, was worried that too much wind might further damage the mainmast. She offered an alternative. "We can launch the two quarter-boats, put them out front and run tow lines from the boats to the bow. Then we rig the quarter-boats for sail and viola, more speed.

Zarina agreed. The rigging worked and _The Pirate Fairy_ felt less sluggish.

"Good work, everyone," Zarina commended. "I do believe we're going to make it in decent time."


	24. Chapter 24

**24.**

 _The Pirate Fairy_ was making less than half speed now that the frigate had so many self-inflicted wounds. But at least it was moving. Progress was slower and the French countryside seemed to pass beneath them at a leisurely pace. From her vantage point Spike could see a large city in the distance. "It's in our flight path," she announced. "What do we do?"

"Nothing," Zarina answered. "We have to keep course corrections to a minimum if this ship is to make it home in its current shape. Let's just hope the humans don't spot us"

"I don't think we'll have much to worry about," Iridessa reported. "The sun will have gone down by the time we reach that human city."

She was right. Night fell when the ship found itself gliding over the French capital city of Paris. The fairies still had to proceed with great care, however. Paris was known as The City of Light in part because it was one of the first European cities to embrace gas powered street lamps. Fifty six thousand such lamps illuminated the city, but all that light reflected off the hull of the frigate making it visible at lower altitudes. Fortunately, the ship's wooded structure was rather dark, helping to mitigate the effect.

As fascinated as Tinker Bell was with the gaslight (a feature shared with London) what truly caught her eye was a new construction. An enormous, wrought iron lattice work on the Champ de Mars which towered over the city. Excited she flew down on her own to study this incredible human wonder, spending hours flitting about while the ship slipped along at its reduced speed.

"Well?" Rosetta asked upon Tink's return, her tone practically shrieking: _was it worth it?_

"It's amazing!" Tinker Bell gushed. She brought with her several trinkets and a book detailing information about what she had seen. It was called the Eiffel Tower, named after its designer Gustave Eiffel. The tower stood 1063 feet tall and was constructed from 1887 to 1889 for the World's Fair. While Tinker Bell continued with her monologue about the tower, most of the other fairies gave up and went to bed or to their nighttime posts. Only Silvermist remained, appearing transfixed but, honestly, had no idea what Tinker Bell was going on about. She just didn't want to be rude.

 **~O~**

While Tinker Bell was busy elaborating about the tower down below Zarina took the time to review her old log books. She kept immaculate records of every member of her former pirate crew as well as an account book of all the plunder they had taken or traded.

Captain Zarina was of two minds about her one time human crew. Her year with them was a great period in her life. Living without the social constraints of Pixie Hollow was very liberating, particularly after the verbal dressing down Fairy Gary gave her when her run away plant nearly destroyed the Pixie Dust Depot. Yet they had also mutinied, having plotted from the very beginning to claim the ship as theirs once everything was in place and they had learned from her the secrets to the Pixie Dust Tree grown on Skull Rock.

Zarina went through her logs looking for anything that should have clued her in to their eventual treachery. Funny how, when she returned to Pixie Hollow none of this seemed to matter, but now that she was back aboard this very same frigate her poor judge of character had come back to haunt her.

 **~O~**

James, who turned out to be the leader of the pirate crew, had professed to be a lowly orphan who sought adventure on the high seas. Later she learned that this was all a lie. James was a well-educated man having graduated from Eaton. She never found out his reasons for turning to piracy. So that much remained a mystery to her.

Oppenheimer, the skinny cook, came from a seafaring family. Most were merchants and privateers, though some were indeed pirates. Oppenheimer and his kin were well known for their prowess in the galley, able to make edible meals from what little that was available to them. Oppenheimer was also well versed in the concertina and his shanties kept crew moral very high.

Dating back as far as the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Oppenheimer's English ancestors participated in the forced indenturing of the Irish, Scots, vagrants, prisoners of war and anyone else they could lay their hands on. These people were transported to the British controlled islands of the Caribbean where they worked at hard labor, effectively having been reduced to slaves.

Bonito, the tall and muscular pirate who disliked rats, was somewhat unique among Spaniards. His hair was dark owing to the existence of Moorish blood which mixed with Spanish following the defense of Spain against the invading Moors by the nation hero El Cid. Bonito, like the others, also came from a seafaring family, though many of his ancestors were lowly sailors aboard Spanish vessels.

At least one was known to have abandoned his ship seeking haven among the pirates or buccaneers. According to Bonito he wanted to escape the "certain death" of the island of Hispaniola where tropical fevers killed many Europeans.

Port (real name unknown), the obese red haired pirate with the peg leg, often claimed he lost his leg to cannon fire. However, James kidded that he lost it to gluttony. It didn't matter to Zarina, he did his job and did it well. Port tended to be a jolly soul, even if how he came to be among her crew wasn't quite so much.

Back in the mid-17th century a man named Oliver Cromwell came to power in England. This was during the Interregnum Period following that nation's Civil War when the country was functioning as a commonwealth rather than a monarchy. Cromwell, a devout Puritan, imposed his own ideals on the nation including his own religious ideals. When the Irish Catholics and Presbyterian Scots refused to convert the English military powers were turned against them.

Tens of thousands of Irish and Scots were taken from their homes by force, crowded into English and Dutch merchant ships and sent to the Caribbean as indentured servants, though in reality they were no better than slaves. Barbaric conditions, brutal treatment and deadly tropical fevers buried those poor souls often in a matter of months.

Port, who had Irish blood in him, recalled his grandfather telling stories that pirate ships often attacked those very slaver ships liberating them of their human cargo. Some of these freed Irish and Scots indentured servants chose to live in settlements on islands not controlled by any European power. Many, though, gladly joined up with pirate crews, turning their attention to sacking more slave ships. Port described himself as being descended from one of those Irish slaves turned pirate, claiming that he had a bone to pick with England and its Cromwellian policies. His turn to piracy was how he intended to exact some measure of revenge.

Starboard (also real name unknown), was the tall and skinny pirate who loved his axe just a bit too much. All Zarina knew about him was that he was descended from "thieves and whores." It wasn't much to go on. She considered that the vague description of his past might have been intentional, to hide his real origins. Starboard always had a strange look about him, as if he could go on a rampage axe murdering everyone in their sleep. Zarina used to chalk it up to the long hours he spend in the hot sun. In retrospect, she now believed that her attitude was the result of her naiveté.

Yang, the large Chinese pirate with the deep voice, had come to England from the United States but wasn't exactly welcomed in a society where the only thing that mattered was that you were White, English and Protestant. Unable to fit in, he joined Zarina's crew where anyone was welcomed.

That was the funny thing about pirates, they didn't practice the fanatical racism and sexism that the European powers often did. You were welcomed like a friend. Zarina wasn't the first female pirate captain. During The Golden Age of Piracy it was common to see African, Mulatto and women as full-fledged ship captains of pirate vessels. Crews were often composed of persons who might otherwise be enemies (English, Irish, Scots, Muslim, Asian, Catholic, Protestant and African). Pirates elected their captain by popular vote and that person could just as easily be deposed in the same manner. Spoils were shared by everyone and, unlike their royal navy counterparts in Europe, disabled pirates received disability income. This was all part of what was known as The Pirate Code.

"Humph. Pirate Code. My former crew certainly didn't abide by it." That was something she should have considered when she first accepted the offer to be their captain. Pirates and piracy were a lost art. With only a few hold outs as the exception there was no one left to uphold the code. No one to hold her crew accountable except her. "My mistake."

Looking back Zarina berated herself for not realizing that her former crew would turn against her. They were almost all to the very last nothing but cutthroats and blackguards. But, wasn't that what a pirate was supposed to be? Perhaps it wasn't so simple after all.

"Maybe I'm just being too hard on myself," she mused.

Zarina closed her logbook and put it away. She lay down in her bunk, pulled the blanket over and quickly fell into a deep and restful sleep.

* * *

 **I just made up the histories of Zarina's former pirate crew, borrowing elements of actual history. If what I wrote sends some of you scurrying for history books or doing searches on Google then I've done my job. You're welcome.  
**


	25. Chapter 25

**25.**

* * *

A lick of sunlight broke through the windows of the large, aft cabin. It crept through the room as the sun rose over the eastern horizon behind the ship. The warmth of the ray of sunlight touched Zarina's hammock. It felt good. Good enough to rouse her from her deep sleep. She sat up, yawned and stretched. After a quick wash and the donning of fresh clothes the captain of the frigate that flies went up to the quarterdeck to check on her crew. She found Iridessa at the wheel.

Or rather, on the wheel. Curled up around one of its handles where the king spoke protruded through the quadrant or rim. She woke the young light fairy and took over for her. Zarina looked out across the bow to get her bearings. "Are we floating lower than normal?" she asked Dessa.

"Uh…"

"Go wake up Spike," Captain Zarina told her. Sure enough the ship was floating much lower than usual. The problem? With so little light in the night sky it was hard to gauge altitude or even the correct angle of the ship which was slightly off. During the overnight hours the ship had taken a slightly downward course. It was a problem which had to be corrected.

Silvermist had the solution: A glass of water. A tall, clear glass with straight sides with a circle around the middle perfectly parallel to both the top and bottom. "Fill the glass up to that line. As long as the water stays even with the circle you'll know the ship is flying straight."

Tinker Bell brought up some tar to adhere the glass atop the quarterdeck railing directly in front of the helm. Vidia took over the helm when she woke and brought the vessel back to its proper altitude. The ship was still progressing a bit slowly but Tinker Bell offered her own suggestion. Given permission she had Vidia take the ship higher up into the sky where the winds picked up a bit.

"Won't you tear up the mainmast?" Vidia asked.

"Not if we get this right."

Tinker Bell slowly and deliberately had Vidia take the ship up to new altitudes. "Okay, level it off." She then fluttered about the ship inspecting the vessels most vulnerable spots including the mainmast, sections of the hull, the rudder and above all the keel. Once satisfied that the ship was in no danger she took the ship higher.

This occurred several times before Tinker Bell observed the mainmast beginning to suffer fatigue from the high winds. "Okay, take us back. Bring the bow down 5 degrees." When the mainmast was out of danger she levelled off the ship and declared that they had found the sweet spot. Well, at least for now. Winds were not predictable up here, even with a fast flyer aboard. While it meant additional observations and minor adjustments she had successfully found a means by which the winds pushed the ship along at just over half speed now. It was enough to shave nearly a full day off their journey according to Iridessa's calculations.

Gliss was especially excited when she was informed. "Now the extra stores we brought will be enough to take us all the way there and back."

"Extra stores?"

Overnight Gliss, Periwinkle and Spike took the ship's dingy, the only small boat not in use, into Paris and picked up extra food. With the ship no longer able to sustain full sail the foodstuffs aboard wouldn't be enough for the entire trip. The trio snatched up what they could bring aboard without being seen by the humans. "We brought a few wheels of cheese. One of them is real stinky. Pew. There are loaves of bread that taste so delicious. Crunchy crust with a soft, chewy center. Mmm. Lots of fresh & dried fruit and several casks of water, too"

"Scratch that," Periwinkle groaned. "Two of those casks hold wine, not water."

"Wine? What are we going to do with that?" Iridessa asked.

Zarina paced a moment before speaking. "As pirates, we often sold goods we couldn't use to merchants in exchange for foodstuffs and materials we did. Maybe we can do the same."

"That's great, but where?" Vidia asked.

"Don't worry. We'll find something."

 **~O~**

Captain Zarina took note of the higher elevation. When it was explained what was done the captain was pleasantly surprised. Tinker Bell proved to be quite correct. They were able to use the information gleaned from their disaster at the higher elevations to their advantage. The ship was now cruising along nicely and the rest of the trip was without incident. Almost.

It was discovered that Lord Milori's owl had stowed away on the ship. She had hidden in the Orlop deck among the casks of extra pixie dust the ship was carrying. The dust had been collected from the tree on Skull Rock prior to departure. Apparently the owl had been moving about in the shadows, picking up food and stretching its wings when most of the crew was asleep.

"Oh no! Lord Milori is going to be so angry when he finds out," Periwinkle cried.

Fawn, though, was more perplexed. "Why would she stow away in the first place? She knows Lord Milori relies on her to get around." No one, though, could provide a satisfactory answer.

"Well, we have another mouth to feed," Gliss sighed jokingly.

Unable to deduce why the owl chose to accompany them on their quest the fairies made good use of her presence flying her down near the surface regularly to search for additional repair materials; confirm navigational calculations; locate roads, landmarks and townships; and sometimes just to let the poor thing off the ship for a while. The owl never got in the way nor did it cause trouble or raise a fuss. It seemed content to just sit at the point where the bowsprit was once mounted and look out across the vast scenery that passed around them.

"Maybe it likes to pretend its flying," Silvermist offered.

Vidia, who always had the worst time suffering Sil's off the wall comments, just groaned. "It's a bird, it can already fly."

"At this altitude?"

Vidia had to stop and think about that one. "Huh. I don't know. We'll have to ask Sled when we get back."

"And you thought I was saying something dumb."

"Uh, you forgot that _you_ could fly, remember?"

The water fairy stopped in her tracks. "Oh, right. I did forget."

"And then you tried to drink your way out of a glass of wine," Vidia grumbled. "A water fairy who felt trapped… in wine. A liquid."

"I was still a little disoriented, that's all," Silvermist replied in her own defense. "That's why I couldn't recall my wings or my talent."

"Yeah, well, you seemed to be enjoying yourself too much in that glass. You aren't drinking from the casks we have aboard ship, are you?"

"Of course not, Vidia," Silvermist replied sharply. "After the weird dreams I had the last time, I'm never touching the stuff ever again."

"Weird dreams?"

"Yeah, I dreamt I was a private investigator living in New York City working with some famous detective."

Vidia laughed. "You? An investigator? That is weird."

"No, the weird part is when he woke me up every morning with a parade of pink elephants that danced on the ceiling."

Vidia shook her head in defeat. "Okay, that's it. I'm never talking to you again until we get home."

"But, Vidia! It was just..."

"No. Never! Not until we get back home."

"You just talked to me right now."

"Aaah! Stop!"

"And you did it again."

"Quiet!"

"And again."

"AAURGH!"

Suddenly the Snowy Owl began to flap its wings and raise such a racket. Fawn rushed to its side to try and calm it down. "Don't be frightened. You're okay. Now what is it?"

"I see mountains!" Spike yelled from the crow's nest. "Mountains ho!"

Iridessa consulted her maps. "That's where we want to be. The Pyrenees Mountains. And we're right on course."

"How long?" Zarina asked of the light fairy.

"Two hours, tops."

"Okay, everyone," Zarina barked, "get to your posts and make ready. Navigating those mountains is going to be a real challenge for us. I want everyone to look alive. No mistakes. We are going to finish what we started and get home in one piece."

Actually, moving _The Pirate Fairy_ between those tops would be far more difficult than she was letting on. The damage to the ship, including the loss of the foremast and bowsprit, would hamper their efforts. But she had to deliver the gold shipment to the wizard and claim the spell which would set Pixie Hollow right again. Soon her quest was going to come to a successful and joyous end.

If she only knew.

* * *

 **If she only knew what? Stay tuned to find out.**

 **Note: Silvermist's odd "dream" is actually a reference to _Elementary_ , a U.S. television series centered around Sherlock Holmes and set in modern day New York City. Lucy Lui, who voices Silvermist, plays Dr. Joan Watson who first acts as Holmes' sobriety companion and then becomes a full fledged investigator in her own right, working alongside Sherlock to solve crimes. **

**The pink elephants are an obvious reference to the movie _Dumbo_ and the "Pink Elephants on Parade" sequence. **


	26. Chapter 26

**26.**

* * *

Precision was now of the utmost priority. Piloting this sea faring vessel through the mountains would not be an easy task. Despite its smaller size and superior agility in the water the frigate would not be able to turn hard or quickly enough in the tight confines between the mountain peaks. To that end Zarina slowed the ship and posted lookouts on the bow and on both sides of the quarterdeck.

It had been suggested that the quarter-boats would be a better choice, but with so much gold to deliver Zarina decided instead to take the whole ship in with the quarter-boats now assisting with the turns. As an aid in navigation Periwinkle flew on ahead, riding on the back of Milori's Snowy Owl. She performed recon and reported back her findings.

The strong winds that rushed between the tops buffeted the ship constantly. Vidia, who was normally at the helm, was put in charge of countering those dangerous winds. Tinker Bell took the wheel in her place while those who were not on lookout duty managed the sails keeping them from filling too much or too little.

Captain Zarina demanded quiet so she could hear the lookouts making their calls. The silence was punctuated by the creaking and groaning of the planks and masts of the ship while the blowing winds acted as a constant, eerie soundtrack. The bright midday sun was also a factor as it reflected strongly off the snow that surrounded them. Tinker Bell ordered everyone to don goggles with lenses made of wine droplets. This provided protection against the harsh reflections and reduced the possibilities of snow blindness.

Every fairy was on edge, fearing the loss of their ship to the jagged, snow covered rocks on each mountainside and face. With the structurally necessary keel in an already damaged state it wouldn't take much to cause critical damage to the hull. Losing their cargo of treasure would render their entire trip a complete loss. Worse yet, their supply of pixie dust was also located in the lowest deck. Without that the little band of fairies would be stranded here, possibly forever. This provided all the motivation they needed to keep their ship out of danger.

 **~O~**

"It's around that next corner," Periwinkle reported. "On the left. I mean it's to port."

The Wizard's Castle. What they had been seeking. Nearly two weeks had elapsed since departing Pixie Hollow. That was almost twice as long as had been planned. They should already be well into their return trip. One miscalculation led to severe damage to the ship, the loss of the foremast, bowsprit and half their sails. Since then the ship limped along at half speed just to get here. Even with the extra pixie dust stores they would have to take the shortest route possible just for the ship to make it back to Never Land.

Applying a gentle hand to the steering and with some help from the quarter-boats and Vidia's talent the ship successfully completed the sharp turn. Then across the bow the snow covered "castle" came into view.

"It's not exactly what I was expecting," Fawn commented.

Fawn, like the others, was expecting a magnificent, shining castle with several great towers piercing the sky and a sprawling metropolitan area encircled by a giant wall built atop one of the mountain peaks and obscured by clouds and snow. Instead what they found was a single crumbling, dilapidated tower built out of the rock face with large gaps between the ill-fitting stone blocks.

"You know, being a wizard and all you would think he would fix it up a little," Rosetta observed.

"Yeah. I mean if a great wizard lives here then where do the lousy ones live?" Vidia commented adding to the common sense of disbelief.

"Okay, so where do we anchor this thing?" Tinker Bell asked.

"Why not right next to it?" Silvermist suggested.

"Are you kidding?" Spike answered. "One little shake and that whole thing could come tumbling down."

Zarina sighed. Spike was correct. The shamble of a stone tower looked like it shouldn't even be standing. Instead she dropped anchor on the mountainside directly across from it, mooring the ship to any secure protrusion she could find. The precious treasure was moved from the Orlop deck to the quarter boats and sailed across to the precipice where the castle somehow managed to sit.

The structure, which resembled a keep, lacked any bastions, curtain walls or other defensive embattlements. The roof was shingled but a parapet was visible surrounding the upper level. Behind it was a small courtyard that featured the remains of a garden and a single fountain as the central feature which no longer functioned and was covered with snow. Perhaps the most glaring omission was the staircase. Any construction on a mountainside should have a means to reach it by foot, yet this had none. It was theorized by the fairies that because a wizard called this place home magic was how he came and went.

"It doesn't look very inviting," Gliss trembled.

"Yeah, I don't know how many magic users put out the 'welcome' mat," Vidia commented in her usual snarky way. "Not everyone gets the whole 'eye of newt, wing of bat' thing."

This description gave Fawn the animal fairy the chills. "Please don't say that."

"Hey, there's a door," Periwinkle called out.

"A door? Why is there a door but no staircase," Spike said. "It's doesn't make any sense."

"I'm worried about where we're going to tie off these quarter boats. There's barely any room for a human much less two small boats," Tink put forth, addressing the most pressing issue. At that moment, the winds began to howl and a heavy snow nearly left the little pixies unable to see anything in front of their very eyes.

"I think we should turn back," Fawn yelled.

"No, keep pressing forward," Zarina answered over the gale.

"We can't see anything," Fawn protested. "We'll crash."

"Shorten the sail, reduce speed. I'm not giving… up?" Just as Captain Zarina was completing her sentence the winds abated, the snow stopped and the small band of fairies were greeted with a most incredible sight. "What the…?"

Each fairy was utterly astonished. Their amazement left them momentarily speechless. In an instant their entire environment had transformed from a howling, frozen maelstrom to a placid, springtime day. Warm and inviting sunlight shown down upon the ledge. A lush and green landscape existed where, only a second ago, there was only snow and ice. The tower was in good repair and looked as if just recently erected. The courtyard boasted a beautiful garden of blooming flowers surrounding a decorative fountain from which sprang water that filled the circular pool. At the bottom of the keep was a large door made from heavy Spanish Oak. And, to Spike's surprise, a staircase descended from the landing.

"What just happened?" Silvermist asked, both breaking the silence and speaking what was on everyone else's mind.

"I think we found our Wizard," Fawn responded, jittery.

"If he can do all this he can surely restore Pixie Hollow," Tinker Bell assessed.

"Or much worse," Periwinkle replied, reminding her sister what Queen Clarion had told them. This magic user was not to be trusted and could turn his abilities against them to his own amusement.

As they approached the wooden door unlocked and opened entirely on its own. Zarina, barely able to register anything at the moment ordered the boats to enter the keep. "Let's make the exchange and get out. I want to start the homeward leg as quickly as possible."


	27. Chapter 27

**27.**

* * *

The Wizard's hidden castle now revealed to them Zarina ordered the quarter boats to anchor on the landing. However, the sails and rudder refused to respond and the pair of craft continued straight into the soaring keep. It was immediately apparent that the doorway was too narrow and low to accommodate the boats yet somehow both vessels glided through without incident.

Clearly it was magic. Or perhaps an illusion. Either way the Wizard they had come to see was expecting them. When both floating watercraft were clear the heavy door carefully shut behind them with a reverberating thud, followed by the loud clank of the lock. The room, save for their own fairy glow, was pitch black.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Iridessa groaned.

As if on command the room was suddenly bathed in flickering firelight. Dozens of sconces lined the wall with torches that somehow spontaneously lit themselves when the visitors needed them most.

"And that feeling just got worse," she added.

"Now what do we do?" Gliss asked no one in particular.

Zarina, however, responded. "We find our host and deliver this gold."

Anchors were dropped to the floor, though there was no place for the boats to go. Against the far wall was a darkened stairwell, formed from the same carved stones as the keep. The little band of friends approached it and peered up into the blackness. Then, as before, the stairs were illuminated by torchlight, yet no one had touched them.

It wasn't just Iridessa who was questioning the wisdom of proceeding. Gliss hid behind Spike in terror while Periwinkle threw her arms around Tinker Bell and shook like a leaf. Fawn acted like her usual tomboy self, but she fooled no one. Rosetta wrung her hands together and wished that Sled were here to protect her. Even Vidia seemed apprehensive about going on. Zarina, however, refused to turn back now. "Let's go. The faster we finish this, the sooner we can head home."

At the top of the stairs was another room. A library filled from floor to ceiling with books. It reminded the winter fairies of Dewey's library in many respects. The books were old and the room smelled of dust and mold. Like the previous room sconces provided lighting. Unlike the other rooms, candles sheathed in glass were the light sources.

At the center of the room was a table with a huge tome set on a book stand made of wood. The book was so thick that its spine was wider than Vidia was tall and each page was large enough swallow a half dozen fairies with considerable ease. The pages themselves were yellowed and their edges were uneven looking as though weathered by time. On them was printed lettering of the type used in ancient texts, written possibly by monks hunched over for hours at a time carefully scratching out each letter in uniform size and straight lines to produce these expressive pages.

Tinker Bell, the ever curious one, flipped through the book and was surprised by what she saw. The ancient script was often written in different languages as if the individual works were collected from various countries and written in the original tongues. Accompanying these words were carefully drafted pictures inked in deep colors meant to complement the writings.

"What does it all mean?" Periwinkle asked.

"I wish I knew," Tinker Bell responded. "I think its history text, but I couldn't tell you what kind of history is recorded here."

"It's got to be a history of magic," Periwinkle offered. "What other kind of history would a wizard want?"

"Look over here." Zarina pointed to another stairwell. Just as before torches flamed to life as if beckoning the fairies to the next room. While the others continued on Tinker Bell and her sister stayed behind to examine the massive book. The third floor contained some kind of workshop. Candles sat about on desks and tables, coming to brilliant life even as the room remained otherwise empty.

Numerous rolled papers and several open books sat about on the available tablespace. Meanwhile, along the walls were narrow shelves upon which sat dozens and dozens of jars both big and small, each labelled with its contents. Some had liquids that were some kind of magic potion. Others contained ingredients such as eye of newt and ground bat wings. A large jar appeared empty, but from within could be heard a strange sound. It was simply labelled _The Wind_.

Vidia apparently could make out what was within. "It's a miniature whirlwind," she said.

"How can you tell?" Rosetta asked.

"I can see it spinning inside. Can't you?"

All the others shook their heads _no_. It was the same for the others. They could see the contents of something if it was an element over which they had magical control. As a result Silvermist could see the crashing waves in a bottle marked _The Sea_. Iridessa was the only fairy able to view the rays of light in a jar labelled _The Sun_. Fawn reported seeing butterfly wings (but no butterflies) flapping about inside another container while Rosetta swore she saw several flowers and stems floating about inside another jar. Both Gliss and Spike claimed that an empty glass jar was filled with a howling snowstorm. Zarina, however, saw none of it. All she could report was a jar filled with flittering fairy wings and glowing dust.

"Okay, we can't let ourselves get distracted," Captain Zarina said, breaking herself and everyone from their reverie. She ordered the others to remain in this room while she went looking for this wizard they had come to barter with.

While she was gone Silvermist located a funny looking hat, conical in shape with a bluish tint and what looked to be a moon and stars sewn into it. "I wonder who this belongs to?" she asked herself. The little water fairy flitted around it studying the strange looking headpiece. She moved inside its cone shape, knocking it from its perch and onto the floor.

"Whoops! Somebody help me get out of this," she cried.

Vidia groaned, then face palmed and finally shook her head. "Sil, that thing is made for a human."

"Yeah, well I wish I was a human right now so I could get it off."

Reaching up Silvermist pulled the cone shaped hat off of her head. She looked around and was confused by something most peculiar. "Hey, how did you guys get so small?"

"Us?! Sil, you're a human!" Rosetta screeched.

"I am?" Silvermist looked down, her legs which had once been so close were now so very far away. Her feet were planted firmly on the ground but she was oh so high up in the air. "Oh my gosh. I _am_ human size! I'M HUGE!"

"Not just human sized, but human," Iridessa corrected. "Your wings are missing."

Silvermist craned her head one way and then other. "Where did they go? What happened to them? I want my wings back" she wailed, frightened.

Vidia scolded Silvermist for playing around with the hat and ordered her to replace it. Silvermist did immediately. "How do I turn back?" the water talent fairy turned human asked, trembling with fear.

"What did you do before?" Rosetta asked of her.

Silvermist retraced her steps in her own mind. She flitted around the hat, then inside of it and it fell on her. She wished to be human to get it off and then… wait that was it, Silvermist had inadvertently wished to be human. "I know, I'll wish to be a fairy again!"

She grabbed the hat and firmly placed it on her head. "Magic hat, blue with moons and stars grant me this wish I wish…"

"What are you doing?" Vidia howled.

"I'm wishing."

"That's not how you made your wish last time," Vidia admonished. "You are such an airhead."

"Oh, Vidia, I wish you would could stop being so mean all the time."

"I'm sorry," Vidia whimpered. "I… I didn't mean to hurt you. You're my only friends and you deserve so much better than this kind of treatment. I've always been alone and being nice to people just isn't in my wheelhouse. I just don't know how to accept other people's love."

"There, there," Fawn said, letting Vidia lay her head on her shoulders so she could cry.

"Now you did it," Iridessa grumbled.

"I don't know," Rosetta chuckled. "I think I like her better this way."

"You're so nice to me and I'm so mean," Vidia wailed, wrapping her arms around Rosetta apologetically. "How do you not hate me so?"

"Uh, well, we just don't take it seriously," the garden fairy answered trying to avoid touching or being touched by the crying fast flyer. Vidia, however, cried even louder, burying her face into Rosetta's shoulder. Ro in turn provided Vidia a leafkerchief to wipe her nose.

Meanwhile, Fawn helped out her water friend. "Okay, Silvermist, all you did was make a simple wish. So just make the opposite wish. Say something like 'I wish to undo my last wish.'"

"Okay." Silvermist grabbed hold of the hat and pulled it to her head tightly. "I wish to undo my last wish."

Vidia pushed Rosetta aside and screamed. "AAAAHH! That! Never! Happened! Do you hear me?"

"It worked!" Fawn exclaimed.

"Thank goodness she's back to normal," Rosetta complained. "I thought for sure she was going to ruin my perfect dress with her nasty, fairy snot."

Vidia turned and fumed at her.

"Okay, now try it again," Fawn directed.

Silvermist pulled the hat down again, closed her eyes and said, "I wish to be me again."

Nothing.

"It didn't work? Why didn't it work?"

"Because fairy or human you will always be you," Vidia clarified.

"Oh, yeah. That makes sense." Silvermist tried again, gripping the hat and saying, "I wish to be my old fairy self."

The human Silvermist vanished and the hat collapsed to the floor. Fawn and Rosetta pulled the conical chapeau off of their friend and were shocked at what they saw. Silvermist was a fairy again, but she was horribly aged. Her skin was loose and wrinkled, her body old and frail, the wings were restored but they looked limp and badly worn. Worst of all, her long and beautiful raven hair was gone. Instead she was almost completely bald except for a few thin patches of white, stringy hair.

"I don't feel… so good," Silvermist complained, her voice scratchy and weak. "Wh… who are you?"

"What the…? What went wrong this time?" Spike asked.

Fawn took a moment to remember what Silvermist had wished for. "Oh, she asked to be her old self. The hat must have locked onto that word: _old._ "

Fawn took the hat and made a wish, trying to restore Silvermist. It didn't work as planned. Rosetta, of course, complained that Fawn wasn't doing it right and tried it her way. Success was still not achieved. The others all gave it a try, sometimes more than once, and each time poor Silvermist was transformed into some strange thing or another. Fawn turned her into a viper that for some absurd reason practiced Kung Fu. Rosetta somehow put flower petals around Sil's neck. Spike and Gliss made Silvermist into a walking ice statue while Iridessa inexplicably gave Silvermist the ability to turn into a body of living fire.

On and on this went until Vidia, who up until now stayed out of this, shouted, "Must I do everything?" She struggled into the hat and said, "I wish to undo every magic wish any of us has made today."

Improbably this worked. Silvermist was restored to her proper fairy form and proper fairy age. Sil took one look at herself, craning her neck to make sure. "It worked! I'm a water fairy again. And my wings. My wings are back." She grabbed one of the gossamer extensions and pulled around, kissing it rapturously. "Oh how I missed you, I'll never wish you away ever again."

"O-okay!" Iridessa whispered to her companions. "Anyone else find this just a bit awkward?"

They all nodded in silent agreement. To determine if she was properly restored, Silvermist went to a cup and pulled out the water in a wiggling, shaking blob. She formed into various shapes and even flung it around the room before safely returning the water to its cup. "Yup, I'm me again."

Vidia was about to return the hat to its hook when she had a thought. She made a wish to fix all the damage done to their wooden vessel without losing its ability to be navigated while in flight.

"Vidia what have you done?" Rosetta asked, shocked. "What if it doesn't work?"

"It has to, I'm not spending another minute aboard that ship than is absolutely necessary." It wasn't a bitter response nor was there any malice to her rebuke. Vidia simply had had enough of life aboard ship and was eager to get back to what she was born to do. It was a sentiment the others could relate to.

At that moment Zarina returned. The Wizard of this castle was in actuality a Sorcerer, she announced. A familiar, the Sorcerer's Apprentice turned into a black cat for waking him during the last torpor, had informed her of this. Their host was an older fellow with long, white hair and a balding spot on his head. He was fast asleep, protected by a spell to prevent intrusions. "I did find the magic scroll we needed," she told everyone. Then she noticed that something seemed not quite right with her companions. "Wait… What happened in here?"

The others all stared in wide eyed horror, as if somehow she knew. Then they replied in unison, "Nothing!"

Zarina quirked a disbelieving eyebrow. She was about to ask again when Tinker Bell shot up the stairs yelling. "Guys, guys, we found it. We found where the curse originated."

"It's all right in that big book we found," Periwinkle added. "Come on, we'll show you."

Gathered around the heavy tome Tinker Bell showed them the pages which detailed the kind of curse which had afflicted Pixie Hollow. There was also a map which gave a location of the curse's point of origin. "It's deep in the Austro Hungarian Empire. Some kind of hilltop or rise or mountaintop," Tinker Bell said. "I can't translate this Latin very well, but if I understand this correctly nothing grows up there, it's completely barren."

Zarina was taken aback. "When did you learn to read Latin?"

Tinker Bell blushed a moment. "Lizzy's been teaching me." Mastering Latin was a requirement at the school the human girl attended. Dr. Griffiths did his best to assist Lizzy in her schoolwork, but when he was away at the Conservatory or deep in scientific research the girl would enlist the aid of Tinker Bell. The two friends reviewed the lesson for each day then practiced it in conversation and on paper. "I'm sort of her study partner."

"Well it doesn't matter," Zarina answered. "We have the counter spell. We can go now."

"There isn't a counter spell," Periwinkle sadly told her. "Not according to this book."

"Are you sure?" Fawn asked. "You did say your Latin was pretty shaky."

"Of this, I'm sure," Tinker Bell replied. "Whatever is in that scroll won't work."

The girls all looked at each other in deep shock. "You know what that means, don't you?" Iridessa asked.

"Yeah, it means Queen Clarion lied to us," Vidia gasped. "We came all this way for nothing."

* * *

 **Inspiration was slow in coming for this chapter, but here it is, finally.**

 **There are some in jokes during Silvermist's many transformations:**

 **The viper that practices Kung Fu is a reference to Master Viper in _Kung Fu Panda_. Lucy Liu also provides the voice.**  
 **The petals around her neck come from the final episode of _Kim Possible_ when Dr. Drakken wound up with the same problem.**  
 **The walking ice statue is a reference to Iceman from _The Uncanny X-Men_ comic books.**  
 **The ability to change into a body of fire is a reference to Johnny Storm from _The Fantastic Four_ comic books. **

**These have no relation to Lucy Liu, but what the heck, I threw 'em in anyway.**


	28. Chapter 28

**28.**

* * *

"How could our queen lie to us?" Iridessa asked.

"She's done it before," Tinker Bell corrected her. "Remember the border?"

"Tinker Bell, are you sure you're reading that correctly?" Zarina asked again.

"I think so," she answered.

"She's right," a voice announced. A black cat, the Sorcerer's Apprentice turned familiar, leapt to the table. The fairies hid behind the book, shaking with terror. Their last encounter with a cat, Lizzy's pet Mr. Twitches, didn't go very well. He chased them around the house like they were mice. This feline, however, was more hospitable. "Don't worry, I won't harm you."

Zarina, who was the only one not slink away in terror, sunk to the table in disillusionment. "I can't…, I can't believe this was an empty trip. Why send us all this way for a spell that won't work?"

"To make us stop looking," Vidia deduced.

"Looking for what?" Rosetta asked.

"That there wasn't a counter spell. There never was," Zarina said, finally understanding what it all meant.

"She could have just told us that there wasn't a solution," Tinker Bell protested.

"Queen Clarion did," Periwinkle reminded her. "We just weren't listening."

"Actually, it was Tinker Bell who wasn't listening," Vidia clarified. "As usual, Tink, you were so determined to work the problem and find a solution that you overlooked the simple fact that maybe no solution ever existed. And the worst part of it all, the very worst part of it, was that you got our hopes up. And we were all foolish enough to follow you."

"Don't be so mean, Vidia," Periwinkle defended. "We all wanted to believe. We all wanted that hope that one day our land, and our people, could finally be reunited."

"Agreed," Fawn gulped, effectively speaking for everyone in the room. "None of us was listening very well that day. And now that we know better, we can all go home. And it's not like life for us is miserable. We can cross the border easily with Zarina's talent dust which is actually a more attractive option than the previous one. No offense, Tink. We may be coming back empty handed, but we had a great adventure and learned an important lesson about ourselves. So really you can't count this as a failure."

"Speak for yourself," Rosetta complained. "What about Sled and me? I don't want my little Sledikins to be a different man every time he comes a callin'."

"Sledikins?" Vidia repeated with equal parts disbelief and disgust. "I think I'm going to throw up."

"Oh please, get a boyfriend and see how you start talkin'," Rosetta spat.

"Hey, guys, enough. I need some quiet," Tinker Bell yelled. She invited the apprentice turned familiar, whose name was Roland, to help her translate the page. Roland informed her that the curse originated in one of the Western Slavic nations. Near a town where stood a mountain whose top was barren, nothing could live there. Not flora nor fauna. The nearby residents lived in fear as legend held the mountain to be a place of evil. Some believed the spirits of the dead would rise from their graves during certain nights to haunt the living. The locals, who were Catholic (their territory was once held by the Holy Roman Empire), built a church at the base of the mountain to contain these spirits and ghosts and protect the nearby residents.

"Wait! Ghosts and spirits?" Iridessa sputtered. "You can't be serious."

Roland just laughed. "It is just a legend."

"No one can be certain that this curse originated here, can they?" Zarina asked.

Roland shook his head.

"Guys we have to go and find out for ourselves," Tinker Bell told her friends excitedly.

Vidia and groaned. Zarina shook her head. "Not this again. Tink," Vidia replied, "we've come far enough. It's just a legend."

"But legends have some basis in fact," Tink reminded her friends. "Is the curse that separates our world a legend? No. It is very real. It had to come from somewhere. This is it."

"Tink. Stop and think for a moment. If Queen Clarion knew where this curse originated then why did she send us here?" Vidia asked in response. "She is protecting us from something."

"You mean like how she kept my sister and me apart for our protection?" Tinker Bell curtly answered.

"Don't do that," Vidia hissed.

"No! That's it," Periwinkle shouted. "Queen Clarion does know. That is exactly why she sent us here to get a phony spell. It proves Tink is right. This is the place. This is where we go to save our world."

"To save our world from what?" Vidia admonished. "From having to change our talents when we cross the border? Or frosting our wings if we don't want to?"

"Wing frosting only works one way, Vidia," Spike said. "If I want to spend some time in the warm seasons as my own natural talent I'll need the snow making machine."

"And I would like to visit my sister in Tinker's Nook as a frost fairy, not a something else fairy," Periwinkle confessed.

"I'm in," Rosetta announced. "I want Sled and me to be together like we were meant to be: au naturel."

Iridessa, Gliss and Silvermist stifled a laugh.

"Sorry, that didn't come out right," Ro added sheepishly.

"No, no. That's correct," Roland said. "It can mean nude, but also in a natural state. And since I am not in my natural state, I can sympathize."

"I'll go," Fawn said. "Tink has overcome worse. We all have. I think it's worth the risk."

The other fairies all debated and eventually decided to join Tinker Bell. All except for Vidia and Zarina. Vidia had had enough of this voyage and was eager to get home. She was convinced that going further would be totally unproductive. That Queen Clarion knew what she was doing when they were assigned this empty quest.

Zarina was uncertain if she wanted to continue because she didn't think she could handle another disappointment. This entire adventure started as merely a way for everyone to move back and forth across the border with greater ease than before. Now somehow it had turned into a lengthy voyage with the fate of the Pixie Hollow on the line.

Tinker Bell, sensing that Zarina was feeling the weight of being captain offered to take over command of the ship. Zarina, however, understood that their best chance of finishing this quest was if she stayed on as captain. "Thanks, but I can make it."

Vidia, though, refused to give in. "No. I'm done with it. We can live just fine with the way things are."

"What will it take to convince you to come with us?" Spike asked.

"It won't be same without you," Silvermist told her.

"We'll need your help," Tinker Bell said.

"And you're the best helmsman, er, helms woman, the ship has," Periwinkle stated.

"Do it for me and Sled," Rosetta pleaded.

Vidia just harrumphed.

"Then do it for Pixie Hollow," Iridessa said.

"Do it for Queen Clarion and Lord Milori," Fawn said. "They deserve to be together more than any of us. They gave up everything to keep us safe. Now it's time for us to take a little risk for them."

Vidia grumbled, rolled her eyes and finally dropped her face into her open palms. "No. No, because if we find nothing, and I'm sure that's all we'll find, Tinker Bell won't give up. She'll just show us some clue that she is convinced is where we need to go next. And do you know what we'll find there? Nothing. But will she turn around? Never. Somehow there will be another piece of evidence that she is absolutely certain points the way to where this curse started. It never ends with her and we will all be stuck on that ship forever. We don't have enough pixie dust to travel the world looking in vain for something that doesn't exist. So count me out. I'm going home, even if I have to take one of the quarter boats and sail alone."

Tinker Bell felt badly. She hadn't thought about what her enthusiasm was costing others. "Okay, Vidia. You win. If you come with us and we find nothing I promise to give up looking, accept defeat and we can all go home."

"And you'll never say another word about this ever again?"

"I promise to never say another word about it ever again. Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye."

"Ew!"

"Why would you want to stick a needle in your eye?"

"Gross."

"It's something that Lizzy makes her friends say when she wants them to promise something. What it means is that on my honor I'll do as I say."

"Tink, I want to believe you, but you just can't stop working a problem," Vidia sighed. "It's just part of who you are. We go home and one day you'll get us all riled up again and away we'll go on some other half-baked scheme of yours."

"Then I'll go alone," Tink said. "If that makes you happy, I'll never bother any of you again and I'll go searching alone."

"Why?"

"Because I believe, Vidia. I have hope that somewhere out in the world is the answer. I need to have hope. We all do. It's what keeps us going, what makes life worth living day in and day out."

Vidia took in a deep breath and then let it out with an even deeper sigh. "Okay. I'm coming. If only because the rest of you would end up lost or dead without me."

"Yay! The gang's back together!" Gliss shouted.

"Do we have enough pixie dust to make the trip?" Iridessa asked, ever the worry wart.

"Don't worry, I brought a few extra blue dust chips," Zarina told her, revealing a tiny vial she held around her neck. "We'll be fine."

"You know, Dessa, I'm surprised you're coming what with all these talks of ghosts and spirits," Spike asked.

"You heard the cat, they only come out at night," Dessa answered. "As long as we only go out during the day, I'll be fine."

The gaggle of fairy friends, now a crew again, began to flutter towards the stairwell when Roland jumped in front of them, his eyes glowing with anger. "Stop!"

Iridessa nearly fainted. "I knew it, he _is_ going to eat us."

"Which one of you used the Master's hat?"

"She did!" Silvermist shouted, pointing readily at Vidia.

"Hey!"

"You did what?" Zarina asked, furious.

Fawn told both Zarina and Roland what had happened with Silvermist, how she accidentally turned herself human and the results which followed when everyone else tried to undo the spell she had cast upon herself. "Vidia somehow got the hat to follow her orders. She even fixed the ship."

Roland chuckled to himself. "Yes, the hat. It has what you might call a mind of its own. It can read your thoughts and your intent, but it will choose an outcome which will give it the most amusement. Unless." Roland then padded in front of Vida and stared directly at her. "You are different. You made the hat obey your command by sheer force of will. That's the only way to make it work properly. My dear Vidia, you have what it takes to be a sorceress. If you should ever tire of being a fairy, I'll gladly take you under my wing as an apprentice. Er, that is, once I'm ready to take on a student, that is."

Vidia cocked a snarky eyebrow. "Thanks, but no thanks.

"Well, if you ever change your mind, you'll know where to find me."

Iridessa eyed the cat, distrustfully. "So, you aren't going to eat us, after all?"

"Of course not. My dinner is upstairs."

"Dinner? What kind of dinner?"

"French onion soup, Salisbury steak, steamed vegetables, pumpkin basil gnocchi and red wine. We're not savages, you know."

Iridessa laughed uncontrollably, looking greatly relieved.

 **~O~**

 _The Pirate Fairy_ never looked so good. It was ship shape and Bristol Fashion. The entire vessel looked as if it had just been launched from dry docks for the very first time. Every seam was tarred water tight, the sails were freshly stitched and every plank look freshly laid. "Girls, I think we're going to make great time to our next destination," Zarina declared, her energy for this trip having returned.

Inside the galley was fully stocked with coal for cooking and food for eating. The water casks were scrubbed clean and fresh water poured into them. It was if the frigate was about to embark on its maiden voyage. Zarina carefully broke her blue pixie dust chips into even smaller portions and used half to refill their dwindling supply of yellow pixie dust. Now, with their cargo unloaded, the quarter boats returned to their mounts and the anchors secured the vessel got underway, it's new direction was East / Northeast toward the Austro Hungarian Empire and what everyone hoped was the final destination before heading home.


	29. Chapter 29

**29.**

* * *

"Weigh anchor and hoist the mizzen!" Zarina yelled. This phrase, common among all naval vessels during the Age of Sail, meant to retract and stow the anchor while unfurling the sails to depart. Once again, utilizing Milori's owl, Periwinkle helped to guide the fully repaired ship out of the mountain range and out over the French countryside. Here the ship was given a fresh coat of pixie dust before being turned to the Slavic nations farther east.

The frigate made excellent time, thanks in part to an empty Orlop deck. Without the weight of their treasury holding them back _The Pirate Fairy_ was travelling at a faster flank speed than before. Iridessa estimated that it would take only three or four days to complete the trip as long as the winds were with them. Vidia, though she didn't quite sport the same renewed vigor as the others, was more than willing to help the ship along to its destination with her special talents. As did Tinker Bell who continued to adjust the ship's altitude to find the most favorable winds.

Despite the four day trip time passed rather quickly and soon Iridessa navigated the crew to the location on the map. Below them was a small town nestled in a valley. A few kilometers away was the lone church, facing the mountain which Roland had described to them. This mountain formation was not as towering or imposing those in the French Pyrenees. The peak was not tall enough for snow, but unlike the other tops this one was completely bare in a way that seemed creepy, even under the late afternoon sun.

Iridessa held out hopes that she and her friends would be able to venture out to this mountain during the daylight hours, but a group of nuns and priests were active both in and out of the church. The building seemed so out of place here, so removed from the town. One would think it would be located in the center of the village, but it wasn't. Old superstitions died hard in places like these and the chapel's existence was as large a part of the region's history and culture.

"We have to wait until everyone is asleep," Zarina announced. "Probably well after nightfall."

Iridessa was quite disturbed by this. "You mean when the sky is dark and the ghosts come out?"

"Oh there are no ghosts," Vidia reminded her. "It's probably just some old wives tale parents tell their children so they won't climb a dangerous rock face." Many old such superstitious tales were woven to warn away people from something that was dangerous in real life.

"Do you really believe that?" Iridessa asked.

"Absolutely," Vidia answered confidentially. "It's just so much superstitious mythology. Besides the light of the moon will light our way."

"Not this night," Iridessa wailed. "Tonight is a new moon. The sky will be dark except for the stars and that's not enough to see at all."

"We'll have our glow," Tinker Bell reminded her, flickering her wings as a demonstration. "We can light up whatever we need. And if we can't, I'll whip up some quick torches to help."

"Thanks, Tink," Iridessa breathed, calm replacing her anxiety.

 **~O~**

When the night came and the darkness replaced the reddish hues of the last rays of sunset Iridessa did what she had trained all her life to do. She captured the golden rays of last light and carefully place them atop the torches which Tinker Bell had fashioned from the ship's supplies.

As the group of fairies was preparing to leave the last three stragglers from below decks joined the rest. Gliss and Periwinkle took one of the glowing torches, gave themselves a fresh dusting of pixie dust and flit off from the weather deck. Milori's owl, who had been napping below decks, flew out to stretch its wings. It warbled what at first sounded like a "goodbye" but which immediately changed tone as if suddenly terrified.

"What in the world?" Fawn said, looking back. "LOOK OUT!"

The Snowy Owl dove upon the fairy band and grabbed one of them into its talons. The owl curved around and back below decks carrying Spike against her will. It warbled and wailed and squawked with desperation during the return trip.

"What has gotten into that crazy thing?" Rosetta shouted.

Fawn and the others followed the bird down below. Here they found it holding Spike prisoner. Yet its face did not look enraged, instead it looked frightened, profoundly so. Fawn carefully walked towards the owl, whispering soothingly while asking it let Spike go. "It's okay. No one is going to hurt you. We're all friends here. Spike is your frieyyyeeoOOOWW!"

The owl stretched out its wings to their maximum size, flapped them and pecked at Fawn, screeching and squawking. "Wow. Talk about upset."

"Upset over what?" Zarina asked.

"I wish I knew. All I get is, 'Turn around. Don't go there, turn around.'"

"Turn around? From what?"

Fawn tried to talk the owl down but the answer was the same. _Turn around. Don't go there. Turn around._

Iridessa trembled. "Great. First that spooky cat tells us this place is haunted and now Milori's owl doesn't want us going there, either. I say we listen and go home right now."

"No!" Zarina countered. "We've come this far, I'm not letting some fraidy cat owl get in our way."

 **~O~**

The period of torpor had come to an end. The sorcerer woke from his long slumber. He placed his cap upon his head and with a twitch of the wrist restored the cat familiar back to his natural human form.

"Sleep well, Master?" the apprentice asked.

The elder gentleman only grunted. Torpor was a period of rest meant to restore the sorcerer and extend his life. This master magician had lived several lifetimes, using this spell to slow his aging. However, no mortal, no matter how powerful in magic, could escape the great equalizer: death. Soon this aging man's life would come to its inevitable close and he was imparting the last of his knowledge to another who would carry on the legacy which had been passed to him by his master.

"We had guests while you were asleep," Roland said. "Those sweet young fairies finally came."

"They're late," the Master mumbled.

"Yes, sir. They suffered some…"

"Did you give them the map as I requested?"

"Yes, Master."

"Good. Now get back to work, the pool won't fill itself."

Roland bowed and shuffled off, taking two buckets with him. Roland could have used magic, but was instructed not to. Apparently a previous apprentice animated the broomstick and nearly drowned himself.

The Master Sorcerer returned to his book, studying it deeply, as he always did. Always the student he was. Then he noticed something amiss. "Roland! Have you been shuffling the pages?"

The young man returned to the library. "No, Master. The fairies did. One of them, Tinker Bell was her name I believe, found the origin of a spell that has cursed their land. The little pixies are on their way as we speak."

Roland turned to bring more water, but before he could take his first step he was greeted with a deafening sounds of a thunder and the bellow of his master. _"WHAAT!?"_

 **~O~**

"Let's go," Zarina ordered. "We've lost too much time."

"Our torches are already going out," Iridessa complained.

"Yeah well blame that bird brained owl," Rosetta snarled.

"Hey! He is not a bird brain," Fawn defended. "Something just has him agitated."

"Can we stop complaining and start looking?" Periwinkle shouted.

For more than an hour the fairies dealt with Lord Milori's owl who, for some reason, had taken one of the fairy's hostage. Spike was held against her will as the owl flapped, scratched and pecked anyone who came near. When the fairies finally managed to free their friend the owl launched from the room below decks and pulled at the wheel trying to alter the course of the ship. The incident came to an end when the fairies netted the poor bird and secured him below decks.

With the dwindling light the fairies flew off to the peak of the mountain, looking for whomever had originally supplied the curse that split Pixie Hollow into two uniquely different and wholly incompatible biospheres.

"Hello?" Tinker Bell called out. "Is anybody there?"

"Good one, Tink," Vidia remarked. "Let the bad guy know were here."

"Oh hush," Rosetta snapped.

"There is nothing here, not even a bug," Fawn observed.

Vidia started to tap her feet impatiently. She knew this was going to be an empty trip, but decided to hold her tongue hoping Tinker Bell and the others would figure that out themselves.

"Let's split up," Tink suggested. "Circle the mountain and look for anything that might indicate that someone lives up here. A cave, a shack, even some brush that looks out of place."

"I think even a single flower would seem out of place up here," Rosetta commented.

 **~O~**

"Do you know what you've done!" the sorcerer scolded. "You were told to follow orders."

"It wasn't my fault, Master. Tinker Bell discovered it entirely on her own," the apprentice said in his defense. "She is very curious."

"You should never had let them see the book."

"Master, why are you so angry. The stories of the bare mountain are just a myth."

"Myth?! MYTH!? This is no myth!"

The sorcerer turned the page, revealing more about the mountain. The apprentice gasped in horror at what he saw. Then he realized that he had sent the poor young fairies to certain doom.

 **~O~**

"Nothing," Periwinkle reported. "There is nothing on this mountain except rocks and more rocks."

Everyone reported the same thing. The entire mountain was devoid of all life. Nothing grew on this peak. Not even the tiniest insect or heartiest plant dared to live amongst these rocks. It was as if the mountain refused to allow any life to survive upon its hard scrabbled surface.

"It's getting late," Iridessa confessed. "It has to be well after midnight. We should go back to the ship and get some sleep."

"I think we should go home," Vidia offered politely. "It was a good idea, Tink, but we've come to dead end."

"NO!" Tinker Bell roared back. "We've come all this way and I'm not giving up."

"Oh, come on, Tink," Spike moaned. "What else is there to do? We've searched the entire area. No one makes their home on this place."

Tinker Bell assessed her friends. It was clear their resolve was waning. She did her best to firm up that steadfastness but it was to no avail.

"Do you want to go home to the same world we left?" she asked them. "To a world separated? Where Lord Milori and Queen Clarion can never truly be together?"

"But they can be together," Gliss replied. "We've all done so much for them."

"Yeah, and it's not like Pixie Hollow is in worse shape than we left it," Zarina added.

Tinker Bell couldn't assent to their defeatism. She was anything if not stubborn. "Well, I can't accept that." Tinker Bell spun around and from the depths of her but cried out to the mountain, "Show yourself, wizard! We know you're here. We've come to end the curse you've put on our home, Pixie Hollow. We demand an audience!"

Vidia just rolled her eyes. "Yeah, like that's going to work."

Suddenly a blast of cold air screamed across the rock face. Every fairy, even the winter residents, felt the sudden drop in temperature. Periwinkle, Gliss and Spike all clasped their arms around themselves and shivered terribly.

"What was that?" Silvermist asked, trembling.

"I've never felt cold before," Periwinkle declared, her teeth chattering. "I can feel it all the way to my bones."

"So do I," Zarina answered.

"I need a blanket," Rosetta complained.

"I want some hot chocolate," Silvermist offered.

"We could use some sunlight," Iridessa said.

"Can we go home now?" Vidia chattered.

A deep, rumbling voice which seemed to come from nowhere, and everywhere, spoke. "Leave! Now!"

"I'm all for that," Iridessa and Spike said together.

Tinker Bell stiffened. She had found the person who had harmed her people. Now she was going to extract the counter spell. "We will not leave until you give us the means to reverse the curse you placed on Pixie Hollow. Do your worst, there is nothing you can do to scare us off. Do you hear me!?"

Iridessa nearly had a case of the vapors. "Eep! Don't say that, Tink. You don't know what he can do."

Tinker Bell was seeking refuge in her audacity to stand up this powerful magic user. Perhaps such a stand would impress him enough to deliver the counter spell. Inside, Tinker Bell quivered with fear, outwardly she was as unyielding as the mountain she stood upon.

"You cannot drive us from this spot," Tink added, stomping her foot. "Show yourself to us. Or are you too afraid to appear before a handful and tiny fairies?"

At those words the rocks began to quiver. And then rumble. The mountain top trembled and shook. Pebbles and stones which had been quietly at rest tumbled down the slope. The entire peak seemed to shake in a terrible upheaval that sent all he fairies into a flight for their lives.

"Now you did it," Vidia shouted at Tinker Bell.

"Earthquake," Silvermist called out.

"No, it's following us!" Fawn shouted.

"How can a mountain follow us?" Zarina asked. When she and the others looked back it became clear.

"It's coming to life!" Spike yelled.

Vidia shot Tinker Bell a nasty look. In her mind, the wizard had cast a spell on the mountain. But her assessment changed drastically in mere moments.

The fairies sought shelter among the trees, but witnessed a sickening sight. From a nearby graveyard the ghosts of the dead began to rise from their headstones. Horrid looking creatures with feathered wings descended upon them, looking like a cross between the bodies of twisted, old women and sharp talons like the hawk for legs and feet. Fiery demons began to dance across the landscape while ghouls and other unholy creatures seemed to be taking their place around the mountain as it came to life.

As frightening as these sights were, nothing could prepare Tinker Bell and her friends for what revealed itself to them. The mountain sides spread open into giant leather wings which seemed to stretch wide enough to capture the entire town in the valley below. Massive, muscular arms reached out for the blackened sky while the ghosts, harpies and demons reveled in their master's awakening, all of them chanting his name:

Chernabog.

* * *

 **Who is Chernabog?**

 **Disney's Fantasia, the A Night On Bald Mountain sequence.**


	30. Chapter 30

**Unification Ch. 30**

* * *

Behind cover, hidden from view, the little band of fairies watched in horrified amazement at the monstrosity they had unwittingly unleashed. Its size and total wingspan could have easily engulfed their homeland of Pixie Hollow. This "Chernabog" as it called itself, had all the clear markings of a demonic entity: short, curved horns on its head; huge, leather wings; red, glowing eyes; massive, muscular arms with fingers that seemed to terminate in long nails perfect for slicing flesh; the ability to summon the dead and command other creatures of the damned; and above all it was surrounded by flames which licked at his dark, forbidding countenance.

"Tink, what did you do?" Vidia asked, her voice quivering with fear.

"I didn't know," Tinker Bell replied quietly. "Queen Clarion never mentioned this."

"Is that what turned Pixie Hollow into two realms?" Periwinkle asked. "That thing?"

"It sure seems that way," Peri's friend Spike answered, barely able to get out the words through her trembling terror.

"What do we do now?" someone asked.

"I vote we get out of here," Iridessa stated. The decision was a unanimous one. Not even Tinker Bell, who had been adamant about finishing the mission, voiced any arguments. Fawn looked up and spied several harpies hovering nearby as they danced in time with the crackling of the flames that surrounded their master. One move and they would be spotted. The harpies would likely capture them all and take the group to face, most likely, their deaths at the hands of this terrible demon monster.

"Stay down," she whispered to everyone, pointing upwards at the winged creatures just above them. Vidia suggested everyone becoming a fast flying fairy with Zarina's special dust to outrace them, but not everyone was trained in her talent. They might crash or lose control.

"It's real simple," she told everyone. "Just follow my lead and we'll get out of here alive."

"But what happens when we get to the ship?" Rosetta asked. "If they follow us that far we'll be sitting ducks while we try to set sail."

Iridessa suggested that they wait until morning. It would probably be forced back into its slumber once the morning sun rose.

Unfortunately, everyone was too scared out of their minds to sit for several hours hoping they weren't found out. Spike suggested that she, Zarina and Vidia go on ahead, staying low and using as little pixie dust as possible to reduce their glow. Once aboard ship they would begin the process of getting underway. Then the others would follow in the same manner. "Everyone will get some dust and become fast flyers. At a safe distance you fly at top speed and don't stop until you get to the ship."

It was agreed then. Tinker Bell was given the duty of guarding Zarina's special flyer dust until the group was in a position to use it without getting spotted. The other three moved on ahead.

 **~O~**

Captain Zarina, Vidia and Spike carefully made their way through the trees and undergrowth. They dared not use their wings or they would glow brightly in the darkness giving away their position. The trek took more than an hour to complete before the ship was in sight and the mountain turned demon far behind them.

The trio of escaped fairies quickly tackled the job of unfurling the ship's sails and weighing anchor. _The Pirate Fairy_ creaked and moaned as it slowly turned into the wind. "Why can't this blasted thing be quiet?" Spiked cursed under her breath. Then the bell rang once. Zarina grabbed hold of it. Neither fairy moved. They both stared in the direction of the demon on the mountain. It did not respond, nor did any of his hellish minions.

"Keep going," Zarina told them in hushed tones. "We need to get to full sail. I'll raise the signal flags."

 **~O~**

The wait for those who stayed behind was truly unbearable. Seconds felt like hours and minutes like days. The sheer terror of not knowing panicked them all. Every fairy in hiding gave into their fright at one point or another and tried to flee. The others dragged them back to safety and calmed them down. Not even Tinker Bell or her sister was immune to this traumatizing fear.

Iridessa was the first to suffer followed by Rosetta and Fawn and the others until Gliss became the last. But when she attempted to pry free of her captors she spied their moment of freedom. "Look! Is that what I think it is?"

Tinker Bell struggled but identified it. "It's the signal flags. Zarina, Vidia and Spike made it and they're ready for us."

"Well what are we waiting for, let's go," Rosetta prodded.

Carefully and quietly the fairies scampered along the ground, moving from hiding place to hiding place all the while looking back for any response from Chernabog or from the harpies gliding overhead. It put into perspective the great difficulty Zarina, Vidia and Spike had getting to the ship.

"It's moving," Tinker Bell whispered. _The Pirate Fairy_ was underway, moving slowly to turn into the wind and back home. The plan was to stay on the ground until the _Fairy_ was moving at near flank speed and then fly to overtake it.

It was very nearly a success. Nearly.

When Tink and the others assembled at the final safe spot before taking flight she gave a look back and saw that no one had noticed their movements. She wiped her brow and turned to prepare for the final leg when she came face to face with a the ghostly apparition of a lancer on horseback, one of the many undead brought back to hideous life by the demonic entity at the center of this maelstrom. Tink and the others shrieked, fluttering their wings in terror and lighting up the area around them.

The wispy horse reared up and cried out to the others. Harpies looked down on its position and immediately saw the fairies, their bright glow giving them away.

"Here, take this and let's go!" Tinker Bell shouted as she handed out the fast flyer dust to each of her comrades. Each took the smidge and dusted themselves with it, instantly transforming them into fast flying fairies with splotches of purple mixed into their normal guild colors on their clothing.

The winged fairies escaped just a half second before the talons of a harpy scratched at the ground, nearly picking them off. What started as a patient marathon had become a race of life and death. The harpies followed closely behind, diving on them trying to capture any of the little creatures in their talons as a prize. Their screeches and wails plunged like daggers of boundless fear in each fairy heart.

No one wanted to look back to see these hellish faces bearing down on them, but if they did not the creatures would capture them and take them to their doom. Tinker Bell and the others poured on the speed, giving it everything they had to try and outpace these winged demons.

 **~O~**

Vidia was busy manning the wheel to turn the ship when she noticed several glowing dots against the bleak background. Her first instinct was to rage against the others for not following the plan accordingly. Then she noticed their pursuers and recognized that the plan had been blown up.

She turned to her shipmates and cried out, "All ahead flank speed! We've got incoming!"

 **~O~**

Tink, Periwinkle and the others dodged the dive bombing harpies and their ghostly accompaniments as they did their best to reach the perceived safety of their ship. Would it actually protect them from these horrendous things? They would soon find out.

Suddenly the attacks stopped and the cackling wails of the harpies began to fade. To Tinker Bell, who was in the lead, this was the sound of relief. "I think they're giving up," she said, a smile across her face. "I think we're going to make it."

She looked back over her shoulder to make sure. The harpies had indeed turned back. Tink's heart soared with the promise of sanctuary and then crashed when she saw why they had given up their pursuit.

"PERIWINKLE! They've got here!"

The others in her group all stopped to turn back. In the grasp of one harpy was a helpless Periwinkle, struggling fruitlessly to escape. She screamed and shrieked and shouted for help. Tinker Bell was the first, racing back rescue her sister.

"Tink, look out!"

A harpy dove on her. It didn't catch her. Tink resumed her pursuit. Then came another. And another. And another. Not one managed to snag her, but quickly Tinker Bell deduced they weren't trying. Their purpose was not to capture her, but delay her.

It worked; Periwinkle pulled further and further from view as the harpy captor and its escorts made a direct path for the top of Bald Mountain and Chernabog. Finally the harpies and ghosts stopped hindering her progress and Tinker Bell rocketed back to the mountain. Driven by fear for her sister she left all her friends far behind.

"I'm coming, Peri!"

"Tink! Don't let them take me," Periwinkle shouted back. "HELP ME! PLEASE HELP ME!"

From a distance came a calm and soothing sound. It did not register with Tinker Bell, but Chernabog clearly heard it. It was the sound of monks, lined up two by two, and singing the _Ave Maria_. As their calmed voices grew closer Chernabog winced and felt pained by the mere touch of the holy music. He threw up his arms as a shield, pointless as it was.

The song had the intended effect on the mighty demon. Though simple and faint it tamed him, forcing him back down into his slumber. His wings slowly curling back around him, his arms crossing over his chest and his head lowering itself beneath the peak of his clawed, leathery wings. Not even this creature from the depths of Hell itself was a match for the serene power of the monks and their holy song.

All of the ghosts and apparitions returned to their resting places, the devils which danced in the burning light leapt into the fiery pits of the mountain and the harpies retreated back to their master and his protection beneath the rocky face of the mountain.

Down into these pits descended the harpy which had plucked Periwinkle from the air. It dragged her down to the flames. Tinker Bell reached out, her arms far too short to close the vast gulf between them.

"Periwinkle! Let her go. Let my sister go!" Tinker Bell screamed as she watched her precious sibling consumed by the flames from the pits beneath Bald Mountain as she was pulled deeper and deeper inside.

Chernabog, in a last moment of victorious defiance, turned to face the tiny tinker fairy. He offered her a wicked, sinister grin before disappearing back into the mountaintop where he had been found hiding earlier.

Tinker Bell landed with a crashing thud on the bare mountain side. She pounded upon it, clawed at it, kicked and screamed at it. "PERIWINKLE! PERIWINKLE! Can you hear me? Peri! Let her go, you monster. Let her out of there! Periwinkle? Can you hear me? Are you still…?"

It crossed her mind. That her sister might be lost forever. "PERIWINKLE! NOOOOO!"


End file.
